Arne Slot confirmed injury concerns for Alexander Isak and Jeremie Frimpong after Liverpool\u2019s Champions League victory over Eintracht Frankfurt. Both forwards were withdrawn early and the manager explained the reasons for the changes.<\/p>\n
Slot said Isak was dealing with a groin problem after he was taken off at the interval. \u201cHe had to go off at half-time because he felt his groin a little bit. We\u2019ve said it many times that it\u2019s such a difficult balance to find with a player who was out for three months,\u201d Slot said. The manager had previously stressed caution in rebuilding Isak\u2019s minutes after the striker missed preseason amid a lengthy transfer saga.<\/p>\n
Frimpong\u2019s substitute appearance lasted just 19 minutes because of another hamstring issue. Slot reminded critics of earlier decisions to protect the player following a hamstring problem that cost him time after the Premier League season opener against Bournemouth. \u201cI think I got criticised for taking him off, didn’t I? It had nothing to do with how he played but we felt he had an issue with his hamstring and by we, I mean the medical staff. It was a good call to take him off. We expect to have him back after the international break,\u201d Slot said back in August.<\/p>\n
On Isak\u2019s usage this season, Slot pushed back on external questioning. \u201cYou bring [Isak] slowly, people argue if you can or can\u2019t play him more, and now we\u2019ve played him for the second time in three days and he had to go off so let\u2019s hope for the best,\u201d Slot said. Isak has not yet played a full 90 minutes across seven appearances in all competitions as the manager manages his workload.<\/p>\n
The squad still has other injury absences. Ryan Gravenberch missed the Frankfurt match because of an ankle injury and Alisson remains out. If Isak faces a longer absence, Ekitik\u00e9 is poised to lead the line. Conor Bradley, who replaced Frimpong on Wednesday, should see increased minutes while the squad manages these short-term setbacks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Slot reports groin issue for Isak and a fresh hamstring problem for Frimpong after Frankfurt win….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3970,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[175],"tags":[195,299,1047],"class_list":["post-3971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-liverpool","tag-alexander-isak","tag-arne-slot","tag-champions-league"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3971","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=3971"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3971\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3970"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}