A TWIST AND OUT

ANKLE AGONY FOR JAMAAL

NEWCASTLE United skipper Jamaal Lascelles is now facing more medical assessment after suffering a recurrence of an ankle injury before yesterday’s match against Arsenal.

Lascelles was left out of the defeat against Chelsea for the same reason but tried to battle through the pain barrier in the opening 45 minutes at St James’ Park.

When asked about Lascelles’ condition – after the centre-back was substituted at the break – Benitez said: “He twisted his ankle in the warm-up.

“He was trying in the first half and we had to make the substitution, so in the end, it was one less option for us to change things during the second half.”

Lascelles is now already a doubt for the trip to Crystal Palace next weekend.

Benitez said: “The doctor said we need to check in a couple of days and see how he is going on.”

Benitez also got through the game without using the services of Salomon Rondon and Jonjo Shelvey.

Shelvey didn’t get a kick in front of watching England boss Gareth Southgate.

Benitez explained: “We had five decisions to make.

“There was Ritchie, who was fine; Jonjo, who was not fully fit; Kenedy who was not fully fit and Rondon and Yedlin coming back late on Friday, so we didn’t want to take the risk with all of them.

“We played Yedlin, Joselu and Ayoze who were doing well during the week, so we thought that could be fine, and in the middle, fresh legs, Hayden coming back with energy, and Diame, we thought we could manage.

“Then after obviously, the first substitution and the two changes that we wanted to do, maybe we could have done something different, but we didn’t have too many options, to be fair.

“They [Arsenal] were in control of the game, so we needed to change too many things to get back into the game.”