Jurgen Klopp has allayed fears of serious injury to key Liverpool duo Mohamed Salah and Virgil van Dijk – but admits he faces a selection headache at Southampton next week.
Salah limped off after barely half-an hour of Saturday’s dramatic penalty shoot-out FA Cup final win over Chelsea when feeling a problem in his groin, while Van Dijk lasted until 90 minutes having complaining of a twinge in his knee.
Both are now unlikely to feature in Tuesday’s Premier League trip to the St Mary’s where the Reds, having completed the domestic cup double for a second time, aim to take the title battle with Manchester City down to the final weekend.
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But the Reds boss is confident the duo have no lasting damage with the Champions League final against Real Madrid on May 28 on the horizon.
“Obviously I spoke to both after the game and both are really okay,” said Klopp. “All that we know is that it’s not a big thing we really came through.
“But the next game is on Tuesday and that’s obviously pretty quick. I think they both will be fine. We have training on Sunday morning, and I’d be surprised (if they were fine then) but I’d take it. We will see.”
Klopp explained: “We had to change Mo early, which was not cool, but it was my decision. It was a precaution. Mo said ‘I can feel something but I can carry on’ and I said ‘nah, no’. A football game is not a perfect physiotherapist, it rarely gets better during a game.
“Then Virg stands with me and says ‘I feel something but it’s fine I think’ so we made a decision together that he stays on. But it was clear when we don’t finish the game in 90 minutes, he had to go off.
“Then you can bring on Diogo Jota and Joel Matip in this moment, that’s the best situation I have ever been in as a coach. That’s absolutely outstanding. That’s why we had the chance to go for it. It was difficult, we know that. It was lucky, we know that. But we deserved it as well, it’s really cool.
“Robbo (Andy Robertson) had a cramp and that’s completely fine, I’m surprised not more had it given what we had to do tonight.”
Klopp admits he expects to make a raft of changes for Tuesday and has questioned why Liverpool’s players will not have the opportunity to immediately celebrate their FA Cup final triumph.
“It’s absolutely outstanding that we can talk about the quadruple – crazy,” he added. “But we sit here now and it’s already 9.20pm and we play on Tuesday night against Southampton. I really have no clue in this moment who I can line up. I think we will have to make a few changes!
“Then we will go there, Southampton last home of the season for them and they won’t want to lose that and that will be incredibly tough. The quadruple is on if you want, and off as well because of the situation. But that’s not important at the moment, to be honest. It’s really special that we won both domestic cups.
“I have one problem and that’s we cannot really celebrate it. How can you do that? It’s such a fantastic competition and such a fantastic occasion and then you limit the celebrations. Obviously the people can do what they want, but it limits the team by putting a game in on Tuesday. I have no idea what we can do but on Sunday morning I will get more information and then we will see.”
