Alex Rogers reveals why injuries to Dejan Lovren and Adam Lallana shouldn’t worry fans too much.
Isn’t it just so typical of Liverpool that our player of the month would get injured? How Liverpool is that? Because that’s exactly what’s happened to new fan favourite Adam Lallana.
20 minutes into our somewhat frustrating game against Swansea, our English Cruyff turn master had to go off through injury after a challenge with Leon Britton. Despite going a goal down and losing a key player, Liverpool did manage to win the game, if not through some amount of luck.
And after the game Klopp revealed that it wasn’t only Lallana with an injury but also Lovren, who has a problem with his groin. He also revealed that both will likely miss out on joining up with their respective national teams for the international break.
So with two of our key players out, who fills in? Saying this, it’s still unknown how long either is out for, but in case they do miss a match or two it’s good to evaluate who could replace them.
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When Lallana came off the pitch, it was Daniel Sturridge that came on for him, pushing Coutinho further down the pitch and Sturridge playing up top with Firmino and Mané. But will he be the one to replace him? Considering at the time we were one nil down and Sturridge was the better option at the time rather than Can or Grujic.
So in the next starting team sheet, if Lallana should still be out, it’s hard to say who would replace him. Can is a likely candidate as Lallana has been playing in a midfield three with Henderson and Wijnaldum. So, Can could definitely slot in easily into a midfield three and Hendo could play further up the pitch.
Saying that, Daniel Sturridge is also a shout. Obviously, it’s very unlikely Sturridge would be in the midfield with Hendo and Gini, so he will be up top with the deadly duo of Firmino and Mané. This would push Coutinho back to join Henderson and Wijnaldum in the midfield three as we’ve seen him before.
These two options are the most likely options, but there are many more options. Lucas could be a shout, or even a change in formation could be a choice, who knows.
That leaves us with Lovren. Well, there’s only really two players that could replace Lovren at this point in time. Either Klavan or Lucas. The former seems the most likely option but Lucas can put in a good shift in the back four as we’ve seen him do before, maybe even grabbing himself an assist or two from centre back as we saw him do against Leicester, crossing in an amazing pass for Vardy. A true passing genius.
There is also Sakho, but it’s pretty obvious that we won’t be seeing him for a while unless there’s many more injuries.
So, despite these two injuries, unless they are long term injuries, it isn’t as bad as it would first seem as their replacements are very good! Going a few games without Lovren and Lallana is definitely survivable.