Tonali was forced to sit out the Magpies’ weekend win at Chelsea because he was struggling with an illness, and the Italian midfielder did not train before boarding today's flight to Spain.
He was part of the Newcastle squad that trained on the Nou Camp pitch this afternoon though, and given his accentuated importance at the heart of midfield in the absence of injured skipper Bruno Guimaraes, Howe will give him every chance to prove his wellbeing ahead of tomorrow’s second-leg decider.
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“We’ll have a look at Sandro,” said the Newcastle boss. “Today is the first day that we’ve seen him. It’s an opportunity for him to train, hopefully he feels strong enough, and then we’ll make a decision tomorrow.”
Tonali’s future has once again been the subject of debate this week, with the Italian’s agent, Giuseppe Riso, hinted that the midfielder is ready to think about leaving Tyneside.
Riso claimed he engineered Tonali’s move to Newcastle to “try to turn him into a star player”, implying that the 25-year-old could look to move on to bigger and better things in the summer, but Howe insisted he would rather listen to the player than his representative.
“I think the person that really matters the most in this is Sandro, so I would prefer to take my lead from him,” he said. “And all I have ever seen from Sandro is someone who is totally committed, very much part of the team.
“He’s very selfless at times. He’s here for the team, not necessarily for himself, and this is the attitude I’ve seen from him. Of course, it was a really difficult moment when he first joined, but he showed a real strength of character to get through that.
“I think whenever you’re in this situation, you’re really led by the player. Forget the noise around Sandro, he’s just fully committed. Of course he’s been ill for the last few days, but before then, he was fully committed to helping us reproduce our best league form and of course he wants to do really well in this competition.”
While Tonali has travelled to Barcelona, and Joe Willock has recovered from the slight knock he suffered in the weekend win at Stamford Bridge, Miley remains unavailable as the muscular issue that accompanied the dead leg he suffered in January’s Champions League draw with Paris St Germain continues to cause him problems.
“Lewie is not with the squad unfortunately,” confirmed Howe. “He’s trained at home today. We’re probably looking at the other side of the international break for Lewie now. It’s just taking a little bit longer than we hoped.”
Newcastle (probable, 4-3-3): Ramsdale; Trippier, Thiaw, Burn, Hall; Ramsey, Tonali, Joelinton; Elanga, Gordon, Barnes.