Erling Haaland has missed Manchester City’s FA Cup tie against Newcastle (Getty)
Erling Haaland has missed Manchester City’s FA Cup tie against Newcastle United on Saturday night but the striker is not suffering from an injury.
The Norway international played a full 90 minutes in City’s 2-2 draw with Nottingham Forest on Wednesday night.
But he did not travel with City’s squad for their FA Cup fifth-round tie against Newcastle at St James’ Park this weekend.
City have allayed any injury concerns and have confirmed that Haaland is not part of Pep Guardiola’s squad because they are ‘conscious of an intense forthcoming fixture schedule’.
From the side that started against Forest earlier this week, Guardiola has made 10 changes with James Trafford, Abdukodir Khusanov, John Stones, Nathan Ake, Nico, Jeremy Doku, Tijjani Reijnders, Nico O’Reilly, Omar Marmoush and Savinho all brought into the starting line-up.
Newcastle vs Man City team news
Newcastle: Ramsdale, Trippier, Thiaw, Botman, Hall, Tonali, Willock, Woltemade, Elanga, Barnes, Osula Subs: Pope, Joelinton, Wissa, Gordon, Livramento, J. Murphy, Burn, A. Murphy, Neave
Man City: Trafford, Nunes, Khusanov, Stones, Ake, Nico, Reijnders, O’Reilly, Savinho, Doku, Marmoush
Subs: Donnarumma, Dias, Cherki, Guéhi, Rodri, Bernardo, Ait-Nouri, Semenyo, Foden
Gianluigi Donnarumma, Ruben Dias, Rayan Cherki, Marc Guehi, Rodri, Bernardo, Rayan Air-Nouri, Antoine Semenyo and Phil Foden all drop to the bench.
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When asked about his decision to make 10 changes, Guardiola said before kick-off: ‘Because we have so many games.
‘I love to play many games because I feel, not uncomfortable, but when players train and they’re good guys and they cannot play, that’s why I like to play a lot of minutes, a lot of games, because it’s a another solution so they can play.’
Asked specifically about Haaland, Guardiola replied: ‘We have to take rhythm from training, he was not planned to play, I prefer he has good training sessions than be on the bench and travel to play just 10, 15 minutes.’
The winners of City’s tie against Newcastle on Saturday night will be in the draw for the FA Cup quarter-final on Monday.
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