Newcastle United could be without six of their first-team players for their Carabao Cup meeting with Leicester City at St James’ Park on Wednesday night, according to Sky Sports journalist Keith Downie.
The reporter claimed via his personal Twitter account that Jamaal Lascelles, Fabian Schar, Joelinton, Miguel Almiron and Christian Atsu are all doubts for the midweek action while Allan Saint-Maximin is definitely out after suffering a hamstring injury in the 1-0 win over Tottenham on Sunday.
Downie added in another tweet that including Jonjo Shelvey in that list was a mistake and the former Liverpool midfielder is available to play against the Foxes.
It means that Steve Bruce could be forced into making drastic changes to the starting line-up that won in North London to avoid risking any of those key players being ruled out of the Premier League clash against Watford on Saturday.
OPINION
Bruce may have alleviated some of the pressure on himself from the Newcastle fans on Sunday but one thing that the supporters have been crying out for in recent years is a good cup run. Newcastle are a massive club that needs to win silverware or at least come close to silverware. Other than a couple of Championship title, nothing has been added to the trophy cabinet at St James’ Park for decades. This team news ahead of the match against Leicester is very worrying but Bruce was always likely to make a lot of a changes to his starting line-up so that fringe players can get a chance to impress. Hopefully those fringe players can stake a claim for a spot in the side in the future by performing well against Leicester, who may also have the same idea going into this game so they can focus on the league and trying to qualify for Europe.
