Newcastle midfielder Joey Barton, who is on bail after being charged with assault and affray, has returned to training on Tyneside.

The 25-year-old has been back among his Magpies team-mates in the last couple of days.

However, caretaker boss Nigel Pearson declined to go into detail over when he may be able to play for the club again.

He said: "What I can tell you is that the bail rulings are in place and at some point, Joey had to be introduced to training because at the end of the day, he is one of our players.

"He has got back in over the last couple of days to basically assess his fitness, and we will go from there.

"Outside of that, I can't really comment because I am not totally au fait with the details. All I will say is that any rules and regulations which are in place will be met by us."