Preston North End manager Ryan Lowe has confirmed that Alvaro Fernandez didn’t feature against Swansea City last night to help prevent the teenager burning out.
The 19-year-old, who is in the midst of his first loan spell away from Manchester United, had started the last nine Championship matches for the Lilywhites.
The former Real Madrid youngster has established himself as a crowd favourite at Deepdale, and he’s become a key player in Lowe’s side.
But in last night’s 1-0 win against the Welsh side, Fernandez was an unused substitute with former Manchester United youngster Robbie Brady being given the nod at left wing-back.
Ryan Lowe explains why Alvaro Fernandez didn’t play vs Swansea
Since making the season-long loan move to Preston, the pacey and attack-minded Spaniard has four assists to his name from 15 appearances.
But with a pile up of fixtures before the World Cup starts later this month, Lowe revealed that he wanted to carefully manage the Spain Under-19 international who struggled with cramp against Michael Carrick’s Middlesbrough on Saturday.
Speaking via LancsLive, Lowe said: “He’s 19. He came off with some cramp on Saturday and you were thinking ‘can he go again?’ because at some point he will burn out – he’s a baby still – so we have to manage him.
“The lads who went out didn’t go out for bad performances; we needed to freshen it up. I thought our wing-backs were fantastic tonight and important.”
The win against Swansea moved Preston up to seventh in the table and Fernandez will be hoping to come back into the starting line-up for Friday night’s trip to Paul Ince’s Reading.
But with Lowe lauding Brady following last night’s win, the youngster may start the game against the Royals on the bench once again.
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