Newcastle United v Benfica: One influential member of Eddie Howe’s squad will not be allowed to play against Benfica on Tuesday night.
Newcastle United’s third league phase match of this season’s Champions League sees them host Portuguese giants Benfica at St James’ Park. Whilst they were defeated against Barcelona in their last home match in this competition, they did emerge victorious from their trip to Brussels in their previous outing.
A comfortable 4-0 win against Union Saint-Gilloise left Eddie Howe’s side sat 11th in the table knowing that victory against Benfica would give their hopes of qualifying for the knockout stage a massive boost. However, Benfica have been rejuvenated since the appointment of Jose Mourinho as manager and have been beaten just once, against Chelsea, since his appointment.
Newcastle United, meanwhile, will be desperate to put their defeat against Brighton behind them on Tuesday night. However, with such a short turnaround in between games, they won’t have the luxury of having any of their sidelined players back for this match.
Yoane Wissa won’t feature as he continues his recovery from a knee injury. Tino Livramento, meanwhile, has also been ruled-out with a knee injury with the former Southampton and Chelsea man expected back in action towards the end of next month.
Lewis Hall will also miss out on Tuesday night after suffering a hamstring injury during their previous Champions League outing. Although Howe offered some encouragement over the defender ahead of his side’s trip to the south coast, Hall won’t be fit enough to feature against Benfica and will have to sit out a few more matches before he is able to return to the team.
UEFA rules block Jamaal Lascelles from featuring v Benfica
One man who also won’t be able to play for Newcastle United on Tuesday night is club captain Jamaal Lascelles. Lascelles has featured twice in the Premier League for the Magpies this season, but won’t be allowed to play in the league phase of the Champions League.
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That’s because he wasn’t named in Howe’s ‘List A’ squad for the competition. Any player not named in this squad is ineligible to feature in the league phase, with Lascelles the unfortunate player to not be named by his head coach.
Ahead of the beginning of the league phase, Newcastle United had to submit a ‘List A’ squad for the that stage of the Champions League. Clubs can name 25 players in their ‘List A’ squad, including four spots for ‘locally trained players’.
Because the Magpies have no players that fulfill that criteria, they were only allowed to name a 21-man squad, meaning Lascelles, along with reserve goalkeepers John Ruddy and Mark Gillespie, were not included.
There is a loophole available to Lascelles, though, which could see him feature in future Champions League matches this season due to a new rule implemented by UEFA. To manage the workloads of players, clubs can now make one alteration to their ‘List A’ squad if they suffer a ‘long-term’ injury or an ‘illness’ which prevents a player currently named in the ‘List A’ squad from featuring in matches. The exact nature of what constitutes ‘illness’ or a ‘long-term’ injury has not been revealed by UEFA.
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