Newcastle United boss Eddie Howe says a lack of depth was cause of their FA Cup elimination.

Howe has defended his team selection and says Newcastle's finishing cost them dear against Sheffield Wednesday, but admits his squad does not run as deep as he would like.

The Magpies were also beaten at the third-round stage by League One opposition last season. That did not stop Howe making eight changes at Hillsborough and his team duly fell to a 2-1 defeat.

"We were desperate to win the game and I picked a team I thought was strong enough to do that," said the Newcastle boss.

"We are aware that we don't have the deepest squad. We are light on numbers but we feel high on quality. We gave an opportunity to some players who haven't had a lot of minutes this season, and I thought there were positives and negatives within their performance.

"We are bitterly disappointed to go out. We created enough chances to win the tie and their goalkeeper made a number of great saves, but we weren't clinical enough."