Wayne Rooney warmed up for this summer's World Cup by scoring both goals as Manchester United strengthened their grip on automatic Champions League qualification by brushing aside Newcastle United 2-0 at Old Trafford.
Rooney produced two sublime finishes to take his Premiership tally for the season to 12 during a one-sided contest.
Yet the former Everton striker was guilty of spurning a glorious chance of grabbing a hat-trick as United wasted a barrage of chances to inflict an embarrassing defeat on their opponents.
It was Manchester United's fourth straight league win as well as one of their easiest.
Newcastle have shown great promise under caretaker manager Glenn Roeder following Graeme Souness's exit last month, but they should have left Manchester on the back of a much more emphatic defeat.
United, thanks to Rooney's exceptional finishing, were 2-0 up inside the first 15 minutes, a suicidal piece of defending by Peter Ramage helping Alex Ferguson's side on the way.
The Newcastle defender was guilty of seriously under-hitting a ninth minute back-pass and instead of finding Shay Given, the ball ended up at the feet of Rooney who required just one look before finding the net with an inch-perfect lob into the net.
From that moment on it was clear that Newcastle's hopes of recording a first win at the venue for 34 years were gone.
They never recovered and four minutes later Given was once again fishing the ball out of his net after another delightful finish.
Rooney once again illustrated why he will be one of the players to watch at the World Cup as he found the net with ease after John O'Shea had carved open the Newcastle defence.
Ferguson once again chose to leave 22-goal leading scorer Ruud van Nistelrooy on the subs bench, preferring to partner Louis Saha alongside Rooney.
Yet Saha had a game to forget as he wasted three good chances.
The French international should have made it 3-0 in the 18th minute after springing the off-side trap, but he was not the only wasteful finisher.
Cristiano Ronaldo was just as bad. After forcing Given into a terrific 53rd minute save, the Portuguese international fired wide from close range after Rooney had bulldozed his way through the lightweight Newcastle defence.
The visitors were much better after the interval.
Lee Bowyer, a replacement for Shola Ameobi at the start of the second-half, forced Edwin van der Sar into his only meaningful save of the game in the 56th minute but Newcastle were no match for a rampant Manchester United side which now lies 15 points behind leaders Chelsea.
