JETS coach Ernie Merrick believes his team are primed to start realising their potential after Saturday's confidence-boosting 1-0 win against Western United in Geelong.
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Winless in their first four games, and minus Abdiel Arroyo, Matthew Ridenton and Bobby Burns because of international commitments, Newcastle produced a performance of commitment and character to bank three much-needed points.
Their goal came from 19-year-old Angus Thurgate, after a clever exchange of passes with Dimi Petratos in the 36th minute, but they survived a nervous moment in the 70th minute, when Josh Risdon appeared to have equalised for the home team, only to be denied by an offside ruling from the VAR.
Merrick said "we're up and running now" but felt Newcastle had enough possession and scoring opportunities to have won the game by a more comprehensive scoreline.
"We made life a bit difficult for ourselves because we didn't take all those chances in the first half," Merrick said.
"Ten shots to three, 24 entries into the penalty box compared to 12.
"These stats, we keep producing them, but we haven't been getting the end result. If we click, I think we're going to thrash some team."
Merrick said the win was timely because it will provide his players with reassurance that their season is heading in the right direction.
"I think reinforcing is a good word to use, because if you play really well and get no reward at the end of it, I guess some people start to have doubts," he said.
"But I was pretty confident. Apart from one game, we've been playing good football.
"We've only lost two out of five, and now we've won one and because the table is so tight, it puts us one point outside of the top six.
"It's a bit silly to talk about that after only playing five games, but it reinforces the point that we're in the mix, and we've got a game in hand."
Merrick was pleasantly surprised that the crucial VAR decision fell in Newcastle's favour.
"I didn't really pick it, and neither did our players," Merrick said.
"They didn't really ask for it. It was just that the VAR had a look and made the right decision, because it was offside."
Western United coach Mark Rudan described it as "a game of two halves", but had no complaints about the VAR ruling.
"I thought we took too long to get ourselves into the game. We were very slow in possession. We weren't getting into our set positions early enough, ball speed wasn't quite there," Rudan said. "We played into their hands as well. We played very much in front of them and they were just patient. Playing slow allows them to get them into their shape and then they were waiting to pounce on the counter-attack and did that very well in the first half."
The Jets have the bye this week and an extended preparation for their home clash with Western Sydney Wanderers on Saturday week.
