Ruben Amorim has said he won’t throw away games in the Premier League to aid Manchester United’s bid to win the Europa League ahead of their tough trip to Newcastle United on Sunday.
United have got just three days to prepare for the game at St James’ Park following the 2-2 draw with Lyon on Thursday.
Amorim has admitted he will have to be “careful” with his players’ fitness, but insists he won’t sacrifice the chance to climb up the table with too much rotation despite facing a crucial second leg against Lyon next week.
“Sometimes winning games is the best way of preparing for the next one,” Amorim said.
“Of course, I am going to be careful with some players but again we need to be competitive. When you are playing for Manchester United you cannot go to the game thinking about the next one.
“So we are going to face this one and then we have three days, we are going to prepare for the next one without a lot of running and a lot of training.
“It’s just recovering and then we will be fine on Thursday [for the second leg against Lyon] with our fans. But we need to face Newcastle in a way that we can win.”
While United are languishing in 13th place in the table, Newcastle are battling for spot in the Champions League.
Eddie Howe’s side have won four of their last five league games to sit fifth — the last Champions League place after it was confirmed that the top five will all play in the competition next season.
Newcastle won comfortably at Old Trafford in December and Amorim is wary of the threat they will pose on Sunday.
“They have top players, really good on set-pieces, the physicality and the way they are running when they are beaten in the first pressure,” the United boss said.
“They have played together for a while and they won a title that was really emotional for everybody, you can see it during that week.
“We are being more consistent in the way we play the games and we will try to do the same on Sunday.”
Meanwhile, Joshua Zirkzee has defended André Onana after the goalkeeper’s two errors cost United victory against Lyon.
Amorim said afterwards that he remains “really confident” in Onana and Zirkzee backed up his manager by insisting it would be “ridiculous” to single out the Cameroon international for blame.
“We’re one team,” Zirkzee said. “We’re not going to take someone out for making mistakes. That’s ridiculous.”
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