Arne Slot has made clear Alexander Isak is not yet ready to carry a full match as Liverpool cope with the injury to Hugo Ekitik\u00e9.<\/p>\n
On Friday Slot stressed the uncertainty around Isak’s minutes after a lengthy spell on the sidelines. “Alex is not ready for 90 [minutes] yet\u2014depending on the intensity of the game because you never know how a game is going to pan out,” Slot told reporters.<\/p>\n
The manager said Isak is “getting closer and closer. Now, we need him, but there are different options to play as a No. 9, as well. Federico Chiesa is one of them. There are different options but it is definitely good to have Alex back now that Hugo is injured.” He also pointed to the impact of substitutes, noting: “Cody [Gakpo] did really well when he came in in the second half [against PSG].”<\/p>\n
The club has faced criticism over last summer’s arrivals. A new striker had been a priority and interest in Isak was well known. Newcastle United played hardball over the Swede, Liverpool struck a deal for Ekitik\u00e9\u2014himself a target for the Magpies. A few weeks later Isak became the most expensive signing in Premier League history at $170 million (\u00a3125 million). Liverpool had spent $106 million (\u00a379 million) on Ekitik\u00e9 amid intense scrutiny over whether he would be a backup.<\/p>\n
Both Isak and Ekitik\u00e9 have since suffered serious injuries at different periods, and Slot pushed back at those who questioned signing two No. 9s. “First of all, it is a good thing we have signed two No. 9s because there were a lot of people who were debating why we signed two No. 9s,” Slot laughed. “We thought maybe it\u2019s a smart idea not to be the only club in the world that has only one No. 9 and that\u2019s why we signed two and now all of a sudden that looks good and now people are maybe questioning if we should sign another No. 9. ]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Arne Slot: Isak not ready for 90 minutes as Liverpool adjust after Hugo Ekitik\u00e9 injury over the next<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12079,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[175,1125,1163],"tags":[195,299],"class_list":["post-12080","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-liverpool","category-strikers","category-transfers","tag-alexander-isak","tag-arne-slot"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12080","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12080"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12080\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12079"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12080"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12080"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12080"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}