Eddie Howe on Friday calmed fears over Alexander Isak’s fitness but said he would not take risks over his star forward at such a critical stage of the season.

The 25-year-old Sweden international, who has scored 21 goals in the current campaign, sat out Wednesday’s 2-0 Premier League defeat at Liverpool with a slight groin injury and will be assessed ahead of Sunday’s FA Cup fifth-round clash with Brighton at St James’ Park.

In just two weeks’ time, Newcastle face Liverpool in the League Cup final at Wembley, hunting for their first major trophy in more than half a century.

They are also pushing for a top-four spot in the Premier League.

Howe, speaking at his pre-match press conference, denied Newcastle were a “one-man team”.

But he said: “Alex brings unique qualities in that centre-forward role, that pivotal middle role that we need. We have other ways of playing, other skill-sets that we can utilise.”

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Callum Wilson, making just his ninth appearance of an injury-hit season, led the line at Anfield in Isak’s absence, passing up a glorious chance to level the scores at 1-1.

Howe said of club-record signing Isak: “With him when he’s not playing, the team takes a different look. It’s still a team that can be successful, in my opinion, but we’d have to do it a different way.

“Alex has stand-out qualities in his game. We’ve moulded our game to his qualities. He’s an outstanding talent who possesses skills and abilities that make us better.

“That’s no disrespect to anyone else we have. Callum did a great job on Wednesday — we saw some really good bits the other night — but we really missed Alex.”

But Howe said he would not take a risk with Isak’s fitness.

“There’s always a risk with any player even if they’re 100 per cent fit, that’s the world that we’re in. But we wouldn’t take any risks on his long-term fitness,” he said.

“We’ll see how he is today and if he’s fit, he’ll play. I haven’t seen him since the (Liverpool) game, so we’ll see how he is today, have a long discussion with him, I’m sure.

“We don’t think it’s a long-term problem. Obviously there was no risk taken on Wednesday and there can’t be with the stage of the season we’re at.”