Jurgen Klopp will be bereft of the services of Philippe Coutinho and Joel Matip as Liverpool take on Stoke City on Tuesday.
Chelsea, Arsenal, Manchester City and Manchester United all registered wins on Boxing Day and now it is Liverpool’s chance to keep up with the top sides in the country.
Manager Jurgen Klopp is optimistic going into the busy festive period, but he would have liked to have a full strength team at his disposal. Stoke City have proven to be an unpredictable team in the past and are not likely to make things easy for the Reds despite being away from home.
The hosts will be without the services of their attacking wizard Philippe Coutinho. The 24-year-old suffered an ankle injury on November 26th during Liverpool’s clash against Sunderland, and is still to feature for the club since then.
His absence affected the Merseysiders slightly as they failed to win each of the first two games without him. Unfortunately for the Anfield faithful, Coutinho is still to return to training and Goal report that he still remains a doubt for Liverpool’s huge game against Manchester City on New Year’s eve.
Another man set to miss out is defender Joel Matip. The new signing has been first-choice under Klopp, but constant injury woes have seen him miss a number of games for the Reds. Speaking ahead of the game, the manager gave an update on Matip’s condition.
“He is not 100 per cent comfortable. I spoke to him a few minutes ago and he was very positive. But he [has been] out of training for a few days already, and as long as we have other players in training all the time, we will choose them.”
This would mean that Ragnar Klavan will partner Dejan Lovren at the heart of Liverpool’s defence. The duo have been solid in the last two games and will be looking to continue their good run of form in the last couple of matches of 2016.
Marko Grujic has started light training in his bid to recover from a tendon injury, while reserve striker Danny Ings is ruled out for virtually the entire season.
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