Newcastle fans will love what Nick Pope was spotted doing in Atlanta

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Nick Pope is yet to feature for Newcastle United in pre-season after having surgery on a hand injury at the end of last season.

The Newcastle ‘keeper was also forced to miss out on England‘s Euro 2024 qualifiers after opting to have surgery on the injury once Newcastle’s top-four place was secured last season.

While Nick Pope has been back in training with the Magpies he’s not been part of the usual goalkeeping training regime, instead focusing on fitness and foot work.

Nick Pope was seen catching and palming shots away in training

Last night, however, NUFC TV posted a video of the squad’s first training session out in Atlanta and in it we can see Nick Pope training using his hands again.

Seeing Pope back gloved-up and catching balls and stopping shots definitely suggests he’s far down the road to recovery, but it will probably be too soon for him to feature on Sunday when Newcastle take on Aston Villa in the first game of the Premier League Summer Series.

It does, however, heavily suggest that he’ll be 100% fit for the 12th August when, once again Aston Villa will be Newcastle’s opponents as they get their Premier League campaign underway.

Pope was of course a huge factor in Newcastle’s success last season, even going 931 minutes of football (10 games) without conceding a goal.

Karl Darlow and Loris Karius have shared the spotlight in the two pre-season friendlies so far with both playing a half each in the games against Gateshead and Rangers. Karius is still to concede whereas Darlow has conceded three.

The Newcastle goalkeeping situation will soon become clearer

Darlow looks set to be on the way out of St James’ Park this summer with reports suggesting that Bournemouth are close to a deal for the 32-year-old who has spent nine seasons on the books at Newcastle.

Martin Dubravka remains Pope’s official back-up but he has yet to be seen in pre-season after being granted addition holiday due to playing international football. Dubs could be in line to play some part against Villa on Sunday.

Hopefully, now that Pope is back to training fully we’ll get to see him play some part in the PL Summer Series with games against Brighton and Chelsea to follow Sunday’s game.