After fortnight away over the international break, Eddie Howe has been speaking to the local press this morning ahead of Sunday’s trip to Spurs.
Starting with the good news, the NUFC boss has confirmed that Fabian Schar (adductor) and Martin Dubravka (illness) are both expected to be fit for the game – despite returning early from training camps with Switzerland and Slovakia.
He’s revealed that the pair have trained and should be fine, also confirming that Jonjo Shelvey is back in contention after a “bad illness” kept him out of our last two games.
Elsewhere, Howe has revealed that a “little bit of Covid” has been in the camp over the break, however he seems hopeful that this is under control and not something that will impact the squad moving forward.
The Toon boss also responded to reports that Dan Ashworth’s arrival could be delayed beyond the summer. Howe insists he’s happy to be heavily involved with transfers “in the meantime” while we wait for a compensation fee to be agreed, believing this is something that worked well over January so won’t be a problem.
Here’s what he had to say on all of the above this morning, as well as his thoughts on our run-in:
Howe on Schar, Dubravka and Shelvey:
“Fabian Schär came back having not trained or played but we’ve had a couple of sessions with him so we think he’ll be fit.
“Martin Dúbravka trained with us yesterday for the first time so we hope he’ll be fine.
“Jonjo has trained. He hasn’t done every session because he had a bad illness but we hope he’ll be OK for Sunday.”
Howe on COVID:
“We’ve got a little bit of illness in the camp, probably as most teams do around the country, but we’ve still got a couple of days before the game so we hope we’ll be OK.
“We had a little bit of COVID during the break, with players and staff, as most teams did, but it’s under control.
Howe on Dan Ashworth delay:
“In the meantime, I’m more than capable of doing things in the transfer window.
“The outcome has been very successful.
“Everyone did a really good job.
“I’m more than happy to do that again.“
Howe on our run-in:
“We’re still in a relegation battle.
“We need points and we’ve got a tough run of fixtures, so I think we have to maximise every game.
“We had a difficult spell of away games so we were pleased with the time away to reset & focus on the final nine games.”
