The surprise leader as we rank every Newcastle United player by minutes played in pre-season

Newcastle United rounded off a successful pre-season campaign with a 2-1 win over La Liga side Athletic Bilbao.

Eddie Howe’s side faced seven opponents in pre-season - starting with Gateshead and ending with Bilbao at St James’ Park.

In between, the Magpies faced 1860 Munich and Mainz 05 in Austria before taking on Burnley and Benfica in Portugal.

United hosted Serie A outfit Atalanta on Friday and Bilbao less than 24 hours later, which attracted a combined crowd of over 86,000.

Newcastle won five and lost two but as we all know, results in don’t matter in pre-season.

It’s all about the minutes and here, NewcastleWorld ranks each Magpies player in order of minutes played:

13. Fabian Schar - 221 minutes

Missed the training friendly with Burnley but returned to play 45 minutes against Benfica and 90 at home to Bilbao. | Getty Images

Scored from the penalty spot in Newcastle’s 1-0 win over Atalanta at St James’ Par. | Getty Images

Returned against Athletic Bilbao after missing the Burnley and Benfica games with a wrist injury. | Getty Images

Had featured in every pre-season game up until his hamstring injury against Benfica. | Getty Images