Newcastle boss on player he 'overused' last season as star prepares for first game in 228 days

Lewis Miley is knocking on the door for a return to action against Chelsea in the Carabao Cup.

The 18-year-old has not featured since March and has waited patiently for the last two Premier League matches without getting off the bench. Miley had to watch on against Chelsea as Newcastle failed to claw a point at the venue he made his Premier League debut at in 2023.

That day he hit the bar within minutes of his arrival but he also has good memories of the taking on Chelsea at home too after recording his first assist, when setting up Alexander Isak in the 4-1 win, against the Blues last season. When asked if Miley comes back into contention on Carabao Cup night, Howe told Chronicle Live: "He does. Albeit, we have to be really careful with Lewis.

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"We have to manage him right and I think last week, when I think to the Brighton when he was on the bench and was on there ahead of time, where we thought he'd be. He has trained well and I have no problem with his training performances, he has looked really good.

"In respect to the injuries he's had we have to be really careful. We have to be really careful to manage his minutes. I will be taking guidance from the experts to make sure we aren't pushing him too quickly."

Howe is also expecting a different version of the Stanley teenager to come back compared to the star that burst on to the scene last spring.

Howe said: "He’s an outstanding player, he’s shown that in coming back to training. You’d expect to see some rustiness from him technically or some physical development still to go, but I think he’s come back physically like a changed athlete.

"He’s more solid and filled out which will naturally come as he gets older, but he looks like he’s used his time away from the training pitch very well.

"Technically he has been really, really good so I have got no issue, I think he looks in a really good place. It’s just a case of managing [his workload] he’s still very young, he’s had a couple of injuries which reflected on maybe we overused him last year and we don’t want him to get injured again. I think small steps initially for Lewis, but hopefully he can progress into playing some big minutes for us."