Leicester City boss Brendan Rodgers was happy with his young players digging in for their FA Cup win against Watford.
Three Academy stars also made debuts for the Club – with Lewis Brunt starting and Wanya Marcal-Madivadua and 16-year-old Will Alves coming off the bench.
Rodgers admits, across his 14-year managerial career, he's never encountered a situation like this, with so many players unavailable for selection. The Foxes, though, battled through against Claudio Ranieri's Watford, a tough opponent in such circumstances at this stage of the FA Cup.
"No, never," he said, when asked if he can recall a similar circumstance. "It's a unique situation it's just really unfortunate. We're suffering so many injuries. Lots of the other teams are as well, but of course our squad's maybe not as deep as others. Especially in this period.
"Players are being overtaxed and then you're coming into a busy period where you're having to play young players like Luke Thomas and Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall in games at Liverpool and Man City back-to-back. It's great, but there's a cost to that, and that's why they're not playing today.
"We've never had [this before] but we'll get through it and days like today make it worthwhile when the young players play."
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