Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp has confirmed that Jota will be out for “more than a month” after injuring his left knee during his side’s 4-1 win over Brentford on Saturday.
The 27-year-old Portugal international had to be withdrawn 44 minutes into the game, with Brentford captain Christian Norgaard landing on his leg after challenging for the ball. The Liverpool forward received treatment on the pitch for several minutes before being taken off on a stretcher.
He was replaced by Mohammed Salah who had missed Liverpool’s last eight matches in all competitions due to his Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) commitments with Egypt and the subsequent hamstring injury he suffered in their second group game.
On Jota’s knee injury, Klopp said: ” With Diogo, it will take more than a month.”
Curtis Jones was also substituted due to an injury during the victory at the G-Tech Community Stadium. The Englishman had lost the ball in a tussle with Norgaard 10 minutes earlier and stayed down, before eventually hobbling to the sidelines.
Darwin Nunez was substituted off at half-time having scored the opening goal of the game, assisted by Jota.
Trent Alexander-Arnold missed the Brentford game after re-aggravating an existing knee injury. Alisson also missed the Brentford victory due to a hamstring injury.
Klopp provided further injury updates ahead of his side’s game against Luton Town on Wednesday, saying: “With Curtis (Jones) – with injuries you have important days like day five, day ten when you then judge the situation again because nobody reacts in the same way. It depends on the pain level and stuff like this, so I couldn’t say or give you a time frame even if I wanted to.”
“It’s not great, definitely not. I would like to sit here and say absolutely no issues but obviously, we have some. So, not available: Ali (Alisson), that’s a muscle injury where we don’t know exactly how long it takes, but definitely not for the foreseeable time coming back. Diogo (Jota) with a knee issue is ruled out. Curtis with a bone ligament issue is ruled out.
“Then we have the others where we will deal with it day by day with muscle things. We will see for tomorrow, you see the line-up early enough and then you can see who made it and who didn’t make it.
“A little bit longer term like Trent (Alexander-Arnold) and Dom (Szoboszlai), they are on their way back but not in team training yet. So that means they are not available as well.”
(Getty Images)
