Newcastle United star out of Arsenal clash and major doubt for Nottingham Forest game

Wilson is yet to feature for the Magpies this season after suffering an injury to his back during pre-season. Wilson has played just six times for Newcastle United in 2024, with various injuries keeping him sidelined throughout that time.

There was hope in the summer that the 32-year-old could be back in action by September, but that return date has kept on being pushed back by the club. Speaking of his side’s clash with Arsenal this weekend, Howe confirmed the news that, as expected, Wilson would not be involved at St James’ Park and raised doubts whether his long awaited return could come at the City Ground next weekend - the venue he completed his last 90 minutes for the club at.

On Wilson, he said: “He’s doing ok, he’s building his load again. There was no real injury but a feeling in his body he couldn't push as hard as he wanted to push and needs to push to play at this level. 

“Physically you have to be perfect at this level. We’ll make a decision but he’s definitely out of this game and we’ll make a decision on how he feels for Nottingham Forest but with the two week gap, it probably makes sense to wait.”

The clash against Arsenal will be Newcastle United’s third in six days with the Magpies set to go again with the majority of the same squad that was available to them in midweek. Kieran Trippier will miss out, whilst there are minor doubts over Anthony Gordon and Alexander Isak, both of whom left the field of play in the second half of Wednesday night’s win: “They both feel ok,” Howe revealed. 

“It’s one of them that we will assess today. Sometimes 48 hours [after a match] you can feel different to 24 hours after, it’s not necessarily always a straight line in how the body feels. They’ve both had niggling injuries, Alex had his toe and Anthony had a groin problem so we will make a decision today.”