Eddie Howe confirms that Callum Wilson will miss the start of the season - Time to go shopping, lads
Our arms are starting to ache after beating this drum for so long but Newcastle United need another striker this summer.
Regardless of what happens with Callum Wilson, we've said it since the curtain came down on the last campaign, we absolutely can not and must not go into the 2024/25 season with just Alexander Isak and Callum Wilson as first-team centre-forwards. It's kamikaze.
Callum Wilson gets put out for a month if the wind changes direction and since joining Newcastle, Isak's injury record hasn't exactly been encouraging.
The season hasn't even started and we already know that Wilson will miss the start of the campaign after having surgery on a back problem.
Wilson has had surgery on his back
As reported by The Chronicle, Eddie Howe confirmed Wilson's injury after the 2-0 win over Hull City.
"Callum had an injection in his back. Without going into too much detail on the injury, I think it was a bulge in his disc which needed treatment so he had that operation and I think he may miss the start of the season.
"But thankfully there are not too many games at the start, we’re week to week so hopefully he won’t miss too many."
We learned last season how inaccurate Eddie Howe's calendar is when it comes to player returns and that statement leaves it open-ended. We originally thought he'd miss the Southampton opener, but now it sounds as if we could be without Wilson for the first few games. We're likely to see Sandro Tonali before we see Wilson.
Time to get the chequebook out
If this doesn't light a fire under the recruitment teams' collective arse to go out and find a new striker then what are we even doing?
It's one thing to be slow and cautious in the transfer window, but it's another to be downright negligent which is how it's going to come across if we don't bring in a new centre-forward before the window closes.
They don't have to be world-class, just decent, we can go for the world-class replacement next summer when Wilson leaves on a free ... unless Clingy Howe offers him a new deal of course.
