Newcastle’s record signing Alexander Isak has withdrawn from the Sweden squad through injury to leave head coach Eddie Howe sweating on his fitness.
The £58million summer arrival from Real Sociedad missed training on Wednesday ahead of the Nations League B4 fixtures against Serbia and Slovenia, his 23rd birthday, and is heading back to Tyneside.
A statement on the Swedish Football Association’s official website said: “Alexander Isak missed Wednesday’s training due to a feeling.
“On Wednesday evening, Alexander was examined by, among others, our medical team and it was established that he will not be available for games against either Serbia or Slovenia. Alexander will therefore leave the squad.”
Manger Janne Andersson added: “It is of course sad, mainly for Alex, but also for us as a team. But after speaking with both our medical team and Alex, it is the right decision for him to leave. I hope he is back as soon as possible.”
Isak, who started three of his country’s four games in June, was disappointed at having to pull out.
He said: “It feels very sad to have to leave the team. I had longed to play in the blue and yellow shirt again. I wish the boys the best of luck on Saturday and Tuesday.”
The news will come as a blow too to Magpies boss Howe, who completed his swoop for Isak as the summer transfer window drew to a close with Callum Wilson nursing the hamstring injury which has sidelined him since the 3-3 draw with champions Manchester City on August 21.
Wilson is close to a return, but Newcastle face an anxious wait to discover the extent of their big-money buy’s injury ahead of next Saturday’s trip to promoted Fulham.
Isak scored on his debut at Liverpool and converted a penalty to secure a 1-1 draw with Bournemouth at the weekend, but is yet to finish on the winning side in his three appearances to date for the club, who have not won a Premier League game since the opening day of the season.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here