\n<\/p>\n
Head coach Eddie Howe admits <\/b>Newcastle United<\/b>‘s defensive options are looking thin after Tino Livramento was ruled out for up to two months with a hamstring injury.<\/b><\/p>\n
The defender hobbled off in his side’s dramatic penalty shootout win against Bournemouth in the FA Cup on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Livramento only returned from a knee lay-off earlier this month and Howe said he was “absolutely devastated for him because he’s worked so hard to come back”.<\/p>\n
The 23-year-old, who has three England caps, faces a race against time to prove his fitness before the March internationals against Japan and Uruguay.<\/p>\n
The setback leaves Newcastle light of defensive options at a time when Dan Burn, Fabian Schar and Emil Krafth are already out.<\/p>\n
“Defensively we’re really stretched,” Howe said following his side’s 2-0 defeat in the Carabao Cup semi-final first leg against Manchester City. <\/p>\n
“We’re pinning our hopes on Dan being back pretty soon. <\/p>\n
“That would give us a massive lift and, of course, the transfer market is still available to us.”<\/p>\n
Burn suffered a broken rib and punctured lung in the derby defeat against Sunderland, but could return before the end of the month.<\/p>\n
Howe also has the option of recalling left-back Matt Targett, who is on loan at Middlesbrough, while there are still two-and-a-half weeks left for the club to recruit in the transfer window.<\/p>\n
Newcastle have money to spend, if needed, but any mid-season moves would have an impact on what the club can do this summer when there are potentially better options available and more value in the market.<\/p>\n
Howe has openly questioned if the “right player” is obtainable in the mid-season window.<\/p>\n
But Malick Thiaw, Sven Botman, Lewis Hall, Kieran Trippier and midfielder Lewis Miley, who has filled in expertly at right-back, are his only available senior defensive options going into Sunday’s trip to Wolves.<\/p>\n
Newcastle then face PSV, Aston Villa (twice), Paris St-Germain, Liverpool, Manchester City, Brentford and Tottenham over the course of 24 days.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Head coach Eddie Howe admits Newcastle United‘s defensive options are looking thin after Tino Livramento was ruled out for up to two months with a hamstring injury. The defender hobbled off in his side’s dramatic penalty shootout win against Bournemouth in the FA Cup on Saturday. Livramento only returned from a knee lay-off earlier this<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5905,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5904","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5904","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5904"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5904\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}