Alan Shearer shares what he thinks it will take for Newcastle United to secure Champions League football

With three games remaining in the Premier League, Newcastle United are in a good place to secure Champions League football for next season, even though the Magpies dropped points at Brighton on Sunday.

In the moment, those dropped points seemed like a huge problem, but realistically, we were never likely to pick up three points at the AMEX Stadium, we just don't win down there.

It is unfortunate that Liverpool have just completely checked out and let Chelsea walk over them in the later kick-off, which saw Chelsea catch up to Newcastle on points, but our destiny is still in our hands, especially given that we have Chelsea and Arsenal to play. Wins against those two drastically change the picture.

However, we don't even need to beat both of them to finish in the top five, and with Everton at home on the last day, we'll be expecting three points from that game, so beating either Chelsea or Arsenal will be enough.

Alan Shearer believes six points is enough to bag Champions League for Newcastle

At least that's how Alan Shearer sees things, as he said on The Rest Is Football podcast he'd have snatched your hand off if you'd offered him a point against Brighton.

“I watched the Toon take a point off Brighton which I would have snapped your hands off beforehand because our record is ****. Take a point, get the hell out of there and play Chelsea at home. It was a fair result.

“I wouldn’t change Newcastle’s run-in. They have Chelsea, Arsenal and Everton. Two home games. I would be hopeful and pretty confident that they can win those two home games and maybe nick a point against an Arsenal that are not at it.

“They’re not as good as they have been or should be because of the situation in the Champions League. Six points will do it because we’ve got to play Chelsea and they’ve got to play Forest on the last day of the season. I think six points will be enough for Newcastle.”

What's to say Newcastle don't take all nine points on offer?

Chelsea will be feeling pretty good after beating Liverpool yesterday, but with the Toon Army behind them, Newcastle will feel like they can turn them over.

We have also already beaten Arsenal three times already this season, so what's to say we don't make it four?

Everton couldn't even beat Ipswich at the weekend, so we should surely beat them. Looking at things through that lens, what's stopping us from picking up nine points from the last three games?

We don't need to, so we must not panic if things pan out differently, but Brighton was the fixture I was most worried about in our run-in, and we got a point there, so we're already up on what I was expecting.