Ruben Amorim reveals emergency action taken amid Man Utd injury crisis

Manchester United head coach Ruben Amorim has revealed that he has been forced to draft various academy players into first-team training sessions this week to make up the numbers after a spate of injuries.

For the first time since Amorim's debut in charge of United after the November international break, the Red Devils have been granted as many as nine days between matches. However, that respite has been punctuated by an unforeseen injury crisis.

"It was a good week," Amorim began at his press conference on Friday, "until two days ago.

"We had some problems also. We don't have players back. Maybe we have one or two issues, we are waiting. We have one player also who is sick so we will see who is fit. But it was good to work with team, to feel the players and try and improve performances."

Not only did Amorim refuse to reveal which players were injury doubts, but he was tight-lipped when it came to the identities of the youngsters that made the leap up to first-team training.

Amorim was pushed on the involvement of Chido Obi-Martin, United's record-breaking 17-year-old striker who joined from Arsenal in October.

"I don't want to say names," the Portuguese boss huffed. "We have to be careful on that. We have problems this week, we called some young players to be in our training. We have some data evaluation. He [Obi-Martin] is one of them."

United are definitely without centre-back Lisandro Martinez for the remainder of the campaign after he tore his ACL during a 2-0 defeat to Crystal Palace at the start of February. Long-term absentees Jonny Evans, Mason Mount and Luke Shaw are expected to remain sidelined while backup goalkeeper Altay Bayindir is also unavailable.

Amorim will be taking the few healthy players he can scramble together to the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Sunday afternoon for an intriguing clash with a Spurs side rocked by their own extensive fitness issues.

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