Eddie Howe has been speaking to the media this morning ahead of Saturday night’s clash with Man Utd at St James’ Park.
On the injury front, he believes that Joe Willock (Achilles) and Sean Longstaff (ankle) “aren’t long-term injuries”, but hints that they’ll be missing for 2-3 weeks; which “feels like a lifetime” with the amount of games coming up.
Sven Botman is “building up very slowly” after missing the past two months with a knee injury. He’s back on the grass but doing light training away from the main group. Howe hopes to have him “back soon.”
Harvey Barnes “hasn’t trained” as of yet, suggesting he’s still a little way off returning from a toe injury, while Elliot Anderson is set for another scan on his back to monitor his progress. Here’s what Howe’s had to say:
“We hope both Sean and Joe aren’t long-term injuries. The problem is even two or three weeks at this stage feels like a lifetime with the games we have. Very difficult to give a definitive time on both but they’re not too bad.”
“He (Botman) is not training with us at the moment, he’s building up very slowly to build his load to make sure we don’t hit the knee injury too much. At the moment, he is reacting well and we hope to have him back soon. We would love to get him back, he is a big player for us.”
“He (Barnes) hasn’t trained with us yet.”
