Town boss Kieran McKenna says Axel Tuanzebe and Jens Cajuste weren’t involved in today’s 3-0 defeat at Newcastle United as their previous injuries were managed.

Tuanzebe was absent from the 20-man squad having recently recovered from a hamstring problem, while midfielder Cajuste was an unused sub, both having been regulars in the side.

Forward Omari Hutchinson was also on the bench having been out for the last month, also with a hamstring problem.

“It’s really just a follow-on from the injury that he had and he’s really pushed to be back as quickly as he could,” McKenna said regarding Tuanzebe. “But he wasn’t available today and we had to protect him a little bit.

“To be honest, Jens and Omari were here to support the group more than anything, not really at the point of being available either.

“We’ve had 13/14 senior players really to pick from today and not probably quite a spread of positions so we can put everyone in their favourite slots, so it’s been an incredible challenge.

“We don’t want to expect any ‘well-dones’ but internally we need to know that we’ve tackled that game well in the first 30 or 40 minutes or whatever it was with the challenge that we had, and the players need to know that.

“That’s how we have to keep going and hopefully we can get bodies back, get some training into the group because the last couple of weeks has just been trying to keep bodies fit and available and try and finish off strong and see if we can deliver one or two big performances before the end of the season.”

Regarding Sweden international Cajuste, who is on loan for the season from Napoli, he added: “He’s just managing his previous injury, really. He’s played a lot of minutes lately and especially the double-header we had against Wolves and Bournemouth and what the boys put into that has taken its toll on the group, to be honest.

“He’s had to be managed over the last few weeks and today he wasn’t quite able to turn it around.

“But he’s so committed to the group and wanted to be available and wanted to be here and maybe if there was a result on the line with five minutes to go, he would have put himself out there, but hopefully now alongside a few others he can recover well and get some training in over the next few weeks.”

Photo: Matchday Images

runningout added 18:49 - Apr 26 2 players I would like to have at Town next season and beyond. Don’t think it will be though
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grinch added 18:49 - Apr 26 Sounds like reactive management rather than proactive back room staff must take blame is the training so hard that we now suffer a more experienced manager may have picked up on this point MK must learn from this we cannot continue with a single plan every game players suffer and so do the team
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Gforce added 18:50 - Apr 26 Fingers crossed we can re sign both of these players for next season. Both would be stand out players in the championship and improve our chances of promotion considerably.
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trevski_s added 00:43 - Apr 27 Really hope we keep hold of Tuanzebe (and Burgess) as both have really stepped up to the Premier League challenge this season. Also hope we at least put in for Cajuste as he has been brilliant in the middle and really seems to enjoy himself here. Get them 3 deals done and I reckon that will be most of the summer deals done (barring another CM and ST)
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blues1 added 10:44 - Apr 27 Grinch. Hiw is it reactive rather than proactive? Do you actually know the meanings of those 2 words? Not playing them is clearly proactive. Nothing to do with training too hard. They've been playing with injuries, and simply needed a rest due to that, rather than risk a recurrence. Common sense really.
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