Jurgen Klopp has confirmed that Thiago Alcantara is back fit and available for tomorrow’s clash with Leeds but was slightly less confident about the fitness of Jordan Henderson as he provided an update on the pair earlier today, as relayed by The Athletic’s James Pearce.
The Liverpool captain limped off after suffering a knock to his knee during the 3-0 defeat of Ajax in the Champions League on Wednesday and appeared to be in serious pain.
Our No. 6, meanwhile, has missed our last two games with an ear infection and was seriously missed against Nottingham Forest as we fell to a shock 1-0 defeat at the City Ground last weekend.
“Thiago is back,” confirmed Klopp on Friday (via The Athletic).
“With Hendo, (Henderson) we have to wait a little bit. He was a bit stiff yesterday and just had treatment. I’d expect him to be okay.”
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The former Barcelona and Bayern Munich midfield maestro will be eager to earn minutes against Jesse Marsch’s side as the Qatar World Cup nears.
Henderson has received criticism of late after not quite performing to the level we all know he’s capable of but his performance in Amsterdam during the week was impressive.
He provided a sublime assist for Mo Salah’s opener and covered a lot of ground against the Dutch champions as we secured our place in the knockout stages.
When fit, both players are regular starters under Klopp and it’ll be interesting to see what XI the German tactician selects tomorrow.
Joel Matip, Naby Keita, Luis Diaz, Arthur Melo and Diogo Jota are all unavailable as they continue to recover from their respective injuries.