Keegan plays down Oba incident March 18 2008
Kevin Keegan insisted there would be no fall-out with Obafemi Martins over his reaction to being substituted during the clash at Birmingham.
The Nigerian impressed in what his first start under Keegan after returning from the African Nations Cup with an ankle injury and set up the equaliser for Michael Owen in a 1-1 draw at St Andrews.
But he showed his displeasure when taken off with 10 minutes to go and appeared to ignore Keegan's offer of a handshake before sitting at the back of the dug-out.
Keegan felt the need to console the striker and admitted the player had every reason to be unhappy as he stressed the move was purely tactical and no reflection on the player's performance.
It was a similar scenario to Tottenham striker Robbie Keane's reaction after he had been replaced during the second half of Sunday's match at Manchester City.
But Keegan welcomed the passion shown by Martins which he felt was echoed by the character and determination shown by his side after trailing to a first half goal from James McFadden.
The Magpies boss said: "I haven't got a problem with him (Martins). I wouldn't be happy to fetch a player off and then seeing them doing cartwheels and being pleased to come off.
"You've seen it with Robbie Keane as well the other night. I like that in players. All right, I went over to him afterwards and said I know it hurts when you come off.
"But it was not for his performance. It was just tactical and myself saying 'let's just shore things up here'. Obafemi put a really good stint in.
"He has every right to be disappointed but I think whoever I fetched off at Birmingham would have been disappointed because they certainly were committed.
"There is no problem. We won't fight or fall out."