Eddie Howe confirms that Callum Wilson will not feature against Brighton on Saturday

Eddie Howe spoke to the media this morning ahead of tomorrow's visit of Brighton and Hove Albion to St James' Park.

Newcastle United were hoping to have both strikers back for Eddie Howe to pick from as Alexander Isak recovered from a broken toe and Callum Wilson was set to return after being out for months with a fractured eyelash or whatever his excuse was this time (it was a back problem).

Wilson picked up a back issue in pre-season and hasn't been available all season despite weekly claims of "soon" when Howe has spoken about his return.

It was widely expected that Wilson would be back this weekend following the latest international break but yesterday Craig Hope claimed that Wilson would once again be unavailable and this morning Eddie Howe has confirmed it.

Does it really matter how much we nurse him at this point?

Howe is obviously well aware of Wilson's injury issues and is being extra cautious not to rush him back.

"Callum has trained, but we will continue to assess it day-by-day. We need to make sure it is the right time when we re-enter him into the group. When we get him back, we want to get him back for a long time, so it is important we make the right call."

Obviously we understand the caution, but we all know that we'll get a handful of games out of him and he'll breakdown again. There is absolutely no way he makes it to the end of the season without another injury.

Throw a few million quid at Lille and get Jonathan David in January

Newcastle must find a new striker next year, whether it be in January or the summer. Wilson is likely to leave in the summer anyway as his contract is up, so maybe see if we can get a couple of million for him in January and splash the cash early.

We are reportedly in talks with Jonathan David over a summer move after his contract expires, why not just throw a few million at Lille and get the job done early?

It's easy for us to say all this, of course, and the reality is definitely a lot more complicated than that, but we're just bored of the whole "Wilson will miss x number of games with x injury".