Arne Slot has asked Liverpool supporters to temper expectations for new signing Alexander Isak while the striker completes his fitness build-up.<\/p>\n
Isak travelled with Sweden over the international break and began to build up his fitness from the bench before taking part in his first Liverpool training sessions on his return. Fans are hopeful of seeing him on Sunday when the Reds travel to face Burnley, but Slot indicated the tall forward may be limited to brief appearances at this stage of his Liverpool career.<\/p>\n
\u201cFirst of all, the Swedish manager, [Jon Dahl] Tomasson deserves a big compliment because he gets maybe the best striker in the world in and needs him for his country but understands that playing him might result in injuries, so he took care of the player and he deserves a big compliment for that,\u201d Slot said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will treat Alex the same, so don\u2019t expect 90 minutes every week, he missed pre-season and team sessions so we have to build him up gradually. But that will be a challenge, but we have signed him for six years, so this is what the fans have to keep in mind if I bring him in.\u201d<\/p>\n
Slot confirmed Isak, along with the rest of his international players, returned without any fitness concerns. The Swede will continue training with his new side as Slot aims to establish a working relationship with his newest recruit.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaybe you don\u2019t believe me but I haven\u2019t spoken to him that much,\u201d Slot confessed. \u201cI phoned him after he signed and he had to go to Sweden but 99% of the time during breaks, I leave the players for their national managers.<\/p>\n
\u201cI text him once or twice but I do have to get to know him in the upcoming days and weeks. But we have such a great culture here at this club, so we sign players for his qualities and I know how good he is, what a quality player he is.\u201d<\/p>\n
With Isak\u2019s involvement against Burnley likely to be limited, Slot can continue to rely on another recent arrival. Hugo Ekitik\u00e9, the \u00a379 million arrival from Eintracht Frankfurt, has three goals and an assist from his first four games and looks set to be given the chance to add to that tally on Sunday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Slot urges patience as Alexander Isak builds fitness; early Liverpool minutes may be limited. today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2688,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[175,969],"tags":[195,299],"class_list":["post-2689","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-liverpool","category-premier-league","tag-alexander-isak","tag-arne-slot"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2689","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=2689"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2689\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2688"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2689"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2689"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2689"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}