James Bunce followed Paul Mitchell through the door at Newcastle United and his main goal is to reduce the number of long-term injuries at the club.

He has plenty of other mandates too, as performance director, but his immediate aim is to make sure that the Magpies don’t have another season like the last one in which key players found themselves sidelined for long periods of time.

We’ve already seen Bunce put his foot down with Sven Botman who underwent ACL surgery earlier this year. At the time he, and Jamaal Lascelles who underwent the same surgery just days later, would be unlikely to return before December.

Since then, Botman has posted training updates that have been very encouraging with many believing he was way ahead of schedule. Since then, however, the message from the club is that Botman will not return before his full period of rehabilitation has passed and not to expect him earlier than December. It’s clearly a smart move as we’ve seen too many players returning from injury too soon and breaking down again, Botman being one of them.

Paul Mitchell certainly didn’t come to Newcastle to make friends

Today, Craig Hope has written his ‘Inside Newcastle’ piece for The Daily Mail warning Newcastle against pushing Eddie Howe out of the club with too many changes following Bunce and Mitchell’s arrivals, noting that the job Howe was able to do before they arrived was amazing.

Paul Mitchell got on the bad side of a lot of people at the club when he arrived and then again when he spoke to the media last week. He’s clearly not scared about upsetting people with Hope noting that some people inside the club were pretty angry with what he said in his first meeting after he arrived.

“Mitchell has ruffled feathers and clipped wings in just over two months. Some were irked by the messaging when, during introductory meetings with staff and players, he spoke about his ‘elite’ standards and of coming on a ‘journey’ with him. He also mentioned playing style, which did not go down well with those who believe that is Howe’s domain.”

There’s clearly going to be an adjustment period as Mitchell and Bunce get to work changing how the club operates, but Bunce has already made one change that is unlikely to have gone down well with the gaffer.

James Bunce has told Eddie Howe to dial down the intensity in training

Hope reports that James Bunce has ensured that Howe dials back the intensity in training to ensure the players aren’t overworked thus lowering the chance of injuries and hopefully increasing performance.

‘Intensity is our identity’ was always the motto under Eddie Howe and it was that intensity that allowed our players to out-run every other side. Of course, it was likely also that intensity that saw so many of our players pull up with bad injuries last season.

Howe may not like the new motto of ‘Intensity is alright but let’s not go overboard’ but even he must admit that it makes more sense to have a squad that is fit for the entirety of the season than one that can out-run every side in the league for a third of the campaign and spends the rest of it on the treatment table.