Jurgen Klopp has confirmed that Liverpool will be without Joe Gomez, Thiago Alcantara and Luis Diaz for tomorrow’s game against Bournemouth.
The Reds travel to the South Coast for Saturday’s early kick-off, as they look for a third win in a row. But as Klopp told his pre-match press conference this afternoon, they’ll have to do it without the injured trio.
“All three are not available, different stages I would say,” said the Liverpool manager. “Joey [Gomez] might be able to train beginning of the week, Luis I hope during the week. After the international break for both possible [to play]. Thiago we will see.
“None of them trained with the team yet. We’ll see how that develops. Over the next couple of weeks we’ll know more. Apart from that after the last game, nothing I’ve heard about.”
With all three players missing for a couple of weeks at least already, good to hear there are no further issues.
No news is good news for Liverpool
Liverpool will have already known they wouldn’t be able to pick any of these three players this weekend. Despite some suggestions that Diaz may return against Bournemouth, that always seemed unlikely to happen.
Besides, with Cody Gakpo, Mohamed Salah and Darwin Nunez in such good form, there’s no need to rush the Colombian back.
The same should also be true of Thiago. The 31-year-old had enjoyed an excellent spell of fitness prior to being injured after Liverpool’s 3-0 loss against Wolves at the start of last month.
Since then, Stefan Bajcetic and Harvey Elliott have made sure that Thiago’s absence wasn’t as keenly felt as it could have been.
With Fabinho back to something like his best, Jordan Henderson looking fine and Naby Keita also available, the former Bayern Munich midfielder should take his time. Obviously, Liverpool would prefer to have Thiago than not. He’s probably still in the Reds best midfield three after all. But we also need him as fit as possible for the run-in.
As for Gomez, his break from the side also comes at a relatively good time. Having suffered through an absolute nightmare against Real Madrid on his last appearance, he looked like he needed to hit the reset button. Should Ibrahima Konate stay fit, it may be a while before we see Gomez again. Right now, that’s absolutely fine.