Naby Keita has suffered another injury setback whilst on international duty with Guinea which could mean the Liverpool midfielder has played his final game for the club.
Keita has been plagued by injuries ever since he joined the Reds from RB Leipzig back in 2018 but has really struggled this season, with fitness issues restricting him to just five starts and 13 appearances in all competitions for Jurgen Klopp's side.
The 28-year-old is now inside the final six months of his contract with no talks over a fresh deal on the horizon. And after Keita picked up an issue in Guinea's 3-2 win over Ethiopia in Monday's AFCON qualifier, there are now concerns that the midfielder could miss the remainder of the Premier League season.
According to Goal, Liverpool are waiting to assess the full extent of the damage Keita suffered earlier this week, but he will almost certainly miss the two huge games against Manchester City and Chelsea. And if the issue - which is currently undisclosed - is severe enough to rule Keita out for the remainder of the campaign, then it's likely the central midfielder's Liverpool career will end on the sidelines.
Keita's injury issues this year have been a big blow for the Reds, who have also lost several other key performers to injury over the course of the season.
It is expected that Klopp will revamp his midfield options in the summer transfer window following a tough 2022/23 campaign - and it was claimed earlier this month by The Athletic that Keita, along with Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Juventus loanee Arthur Melo, do not feature in Liverpool's plans going forward.
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Keita was heavily linked with a transfer both in the summer transfer window and in January after falling out of favour. But after a switch failed to materialise, former Liverpool striker Michael Owen insisted that the former Leipzig star is "just not good enough" to play for the Reds anymore.
Speaking back in February, Owen told Premier League Productions: “I think that area of the pitch is going to need a bit of surgery and I think it’s going to happen in the summer – everyone can see it. Jurgen Klopp can see it. People talk about the age of the midfield there, whether [James] Milner or [Jordan] Henderson should be replaced. They are still their best players in there – people say they are too old, but they are still the best players.
"Fabinho has been average this season. Really average. Harvey Elliott, when he came on at half-time, he give the ball away more than he kept it. Naby Keita is just not good enough for a midfielder, in my opinion, for Liverpool. It’s all right fans saying, ‘we need to change Henderson, we need to change Milner and get a new youngster in’.
“But they are actually the best of what Liverpool have got, at the moment. It might be the others that need to be changed. Considering their age, they have been doing a sterling job and have been for a long, long time.”
