WITH December very nearly upon us, one welcome Christmas gift for Eddie Howe this year would be a prolonged spell of having both Alexander Isak and Callum Wilson fit and available.

With Will Osula not yet deemed ready for first team duty, Isak has had to go it alone up-front in the early months of the season in the absence of Wilson.

But now the England international is back fit again, Howe is relishing the "fight" for the shirt up-front.

And he believes the return of Wilson will help Isak - who'd scored four goals in four games prior to Newcastle firing a blank against West Ham - step up another level.

“I do think there's probably something in that," said Howe ahead of Saturday's game at Crystal Palace, where Wilson is again expected to have to settle for a place on the bench.

"Psychologically when you know you've got a player of Callum's quality and Alex's quality fighting each other for the shirt, naturally that can only increase your awareness, really, of your performance and making sure that you stay absolutely on top of yourself.

“They're two real competitors. They're very different but two absolute fighters that both want to play, which is a great thing for me to have.

“I'd love to have the opportunity to work with them both for a sustained period of time because I think they add so much to the team."

RECOMMENDED READING:

Wilson is approaching the final half a season of his current Newcastle contract, which is due to expire next summer - which will no doubt further motivate the striker to make a big impact now he's back fit.

"I think Callum has loads of incentives internally built within him," said Howe.

"I wouldn't necessarily have to ask him about those. He is a very driven person and does regularly set himself goals.

"I'm sure his contract is on his mind but I think it will be in the back part of his brain because he will be focusing on the here and now and doesn't things that can affect his long term future for the positive."

Amid the uncertainty of his contract, however, there's inevitable speculation about Wilson's future - but Howe says the striker will ignore any outside noise.

"Well, I think as a modern day player now you have to," he said.

"If you don't deal with outside noise and you let it affect you and let it creep into your thoughts, that could be a very dangerous thing.

"One of the challenges for any modern day player, any young player, coming through is the ability to ignore everything apart from obviously the information that you need from people that you respect and have got your best interests at heart.

"So I think that's a new thing that modern players are adjusting to because of the noise and social media and other avenues can be really loud. So if the players sort of took that information on and believed most of it, none of them would be able to kick a ball.

"So I think Callum's experienced enough to know that and is very single minded in his pursuit of what he wants and that's one of the biggest qualities he has."

One knock-on effect of Wilson's return is likely to be even fewer match minutes for Osula.

The summer arrival has so far played just 10 Premier League minutes in four late appearances from the bench this season, but the plan was always to be patient with the striker and Howe is delighted with what he's seeing day-to-day on the training pitches.

He said: "It's an interesting question. I think there's always a process a player has to go through, especially when they sign, in Will's case, with a lot of work ahead of him to get to be the player that he eventually wants to be.

"But he's really committed to that work. I have to say he's been excellent. He's really embraced the coaching side of our work.

"He's worked really closely with Graham Jones, with myself, Jason [Tindall], Steve [Purches], Simon [Weatherstone]. Different people at different times. I think we've seen a real growth in his performance.

"Now he's competing against two outstanding experienced centre forwards but he's got a big part in our future ahead of him."