Klopp gives Liverpool injury update ahead Chelsea final clash
Jurgen Klopp is unsure if Liverpool will have any of their injured players back for Sunday’s Carabao Cup final showdown against Chelsea.
A depleted Reds side were initially given a scare by relegation-battling Luton on Wednesday night, before captain Virgil van Dijk, Cody Gakpo, Luis Diaz and Harvey Elliott all scored in a brilliant second-half display.
The 4-1 comeback win took Liverpool four points clear at the Premier League summit and ensured that they will still be top of the table by the time they return to top-flight action after this weekend’s date with Wembley.
The hosts were without a total of 11 first-team players for a game against Luton that was brought forward due to a clash with the Carabao Cup final, with Mohamed Salah and Darwin Nunez both ruled out to join Diogo Jota, Curtis Jones, Alisson Becker, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Dominik Szoboszlai, Thiago Alcantara, Joel Matip, Stefan Bajcetic and Ben Doak on the sidelines.
Nunez, having scored with an outrageous lob, felt an issue that saw him taken off at half-time of Saturday’s costly 4-1 win at Brentford in which Jota, now expected to be out for months, was stretchered off and Jones was also injured in the first half.
Salah, meanwhile, was said to be struggling with muscle fatigue following his first appearance since a hamstring injury suffered while away with Egypt at the Africa Cup of Nations in Ivory Coast last month.
Klopp had previously suggested that Hungarian midfielder Szoboszlai may have an outside chance of returning to face Chelsea, though Alexander-Arnold had already been ruled out of the final along with the rest of Liverpool’s absentees.
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Asked if he had any update on the fitness of Salah and Nunez after the win over Luton, Klopp, who handed chances off the bench to the likes of youngsters Jayden Danns, James McConnell and Bobby Clark, said: “No. We don’t know nothing.
“We have to see, but I said it before the game – as long as we have 11 players, we will go for it.
“Will we be big favourites? Definitely not. Since we played them [Chelsea], they have improved a lot and it will be tricky, this was exceptional tonight.”