Howe says he had to ‘protect’ several key players in FA Cup loss to Man City amid fitness concerns ahead of ‘biggest game in the club’s history’ | OneFootball

Eddie Howe says he had to “protect” several of his key players in the FA Cup defeat to Manchester City amid concerns over their fitness.

Howe explained his decision to leave Joelinton and Anthony Gordon on the bench and bring them on as second-half substitutes was due to concerns over their fitness.

Jacob Murphy, meanwhile, was not able to come on because of a neck issue in the 3-1 defeat, Howe explained.

“I couldn’t use Jacob Murphy today because of a neck problem which he suffered yesterday and I wanted to see how he felt in the warm-up to see if I could use him,” Howe said.

“So we were really stretched today again and I think the lads that played gave everything but we just ran out of energy.

“Joelinton we didn’t want to start, we felt it was too big an injury risk today.

“I think we’re in a difficult spot because we’re trying to get through the games and perform and to win but we’re also trying to navigate and keep players fit which is very, very difficult to do.

“The combination of the two, I don’t think we’ve got the strength at the moment to make loads of changes and keep the same strength in our performance. We tried to do it with a couple of key players today that we had to protect.

“Anthony Gordon has come in with an ankle problem, we had to protect him today. We had to protect Joelinton today with past experience. These players are too big to lose.”

Howe also urged his players to move on quickly from their FA Cup exit ahead of what he called the “biggest game in the club’s history” against Barcelona in the Champions League.

“I think we have to be, as much as it’s easy to be very negative in this moment, I understand we’ve gone out the FA Cup but we have the biggest game in the club’s history coming up in no time at all,” he said.

“We’ve got to get the players ready for that, we’ve got no time to dwell on this.”