It has been a very topsy turvy season for Liverpool as they defeated title rivals Manchester City and then recently lost to Nottingham Forest which came as a big shocker. Recently Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp shared how their growth and progress this season has been stunted by repeated injury concerns to his players.
The Reds are currently eighth in the Premier League standings and they have quite a few players out due to injuries. There is some news that Ibrahima Konate and high profile striker Darwin Nunez might return to action for them against Ajax in their next Champions League match but they already have players like Thiago Alcantara, Joel Matip, Luis Diaz and Diogo Jota out due to injury concerns.
While Naby Keita and Alex Oxlade Chamberlain are the two ineligible players who were not included in the group stage squad by the club. However Liverpool will be looking to win their match against Ajax or atleast avoid defeat to seal their position in the knockout stage of the Champions League.
Speaking ahead of the game, Klopp shared how injuries can disrupt the season for any team as he shared the difficulties in these situations where he has to manage the workload of his players who arent injured or else they will be worked out and may pick up injuries. So he explains how the cycle goes on and on hampering their season. “It starts with injuries then the problem is that the players who have no injuries have to play too often and then the players that do have the injuries, they come back and play too early very often, that’s how it is,” he stated.
He shares how the medical team also shares some advises on the players who are returning from injuries on how they must not play more than a certain amount of time and that also does not help him at all. So overall Klopp shares how Liverpool are in a spot of bother with the amount of injured players at their disposal.
“And then they come back and play and then they have another [maybe] not injuries but ‘other things’ and then the medical department says they can’t play more than 20 minutes, they shouldn’t do this and they shouldn’t do that, and these kinds of things, and that’s how you go into the Premier League games with a knife between your teeth,” Klopp revealed.
Lastly he shares how things have just not gone their way this season as they play a good game and then lose a player or two due to injury while another one can only play 20 minutes as he is returning from injury. So it has been a constant problem for them and a primary reason why they have been so low in the Premier League standings. “We play a good game and then we lose two players out after the game. Wow and then another one not available for more than 20 minutes, so that’s not easy,” he concluded.
Liverpool will be looking to seal their spot in the Champions League knockout first as they face Ajax. After that they may focus a bit on the Premier League as they will look to improve on their standings and produce better results than they have done this season. Klopp might also be very eager to use the January transfer window but there’s still time for that to come.
