Bruno Guimaraes & Anthony Gordon 'danger' highlighted with duo yet to return to Newcastle United

While Newcastle’s pre-season plans are in full swing following a return from a six-day training camp at Adidas Headquarters in Germany, several international players missed the trip. Kieran Trippier, Anthony Gordon, Fabian Schar, Martin Dubravka, Bruno Guimaraes and Miguel Almiron have all be granted extra time off following their involvement in this summer’s international tournaments.

While Almiron and Paraguay’s exit from Copa America was confirmed last month, Gordon and Trippier only returned from Euro 2024 with England last week. Trippier played all but one of England’s matches as they finished runners-up to Spain while Gordon made just one substitute appearance.

While Howe wouldn’t confirm the exact dates the international players would be back, he stressed it was important that they were not rushed into pre-season.

“They’ll be back at certain times,” Howe said. “I do feel it is important for players like Bruno, Anthony and Kieran that they do get some time away.

“The biggest danger for them is you bring them back too early and there’s no freshness to them and I think that can really damage their season so we have to get that right. But we have a game But we have a game looming very large against Southampton that we have to get them ready for as well so it’s a very delicate balance.”

Newcastle face Hull City in their first pre-season friendly in front of a crowd on Saturday (2pm kick-off) before flying to Japan for two matches against Urawa Red Diamonds and Yokohama F. Marinos in Tokyo.

Reflecting on the return to pre-season training and working with his players again, Howe added: “I do think there is a range of emotions, not just for me but the players.

“There is always an excitement when you come back together because you haven’t seen each other for a long time. I absolutely love the players here so to see them and go back into that relationship and that journey with each other is amazing. I think the attitude so far in pre-season has been really good, there is a very good feel.

“Of course, we are missing some massive players who aren’t here so it feels a bit strange because you can feel there are big personalities not back.”