Jurgen Klopp revealed on Tuesday that goalkeeper Alisson Becker is ‘close’ to returning from injury but will not be involved in Wednesday’s friendly with Salzburg FC.
The Liverpool goalkeeper has not featured in match action since the clash with Manchester United in Bangkok a fortnight ago but is now nearing availability again.
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Klopp’s men take on Salzburg as part of their ongoing training camp in Austria tomorrow, before the FA Community Shield tie against Manchester City on Saturday.
Speaking to Liverpoolfc.com on Tuesday, the manager discussed the challenge he expects against Salzburg and the condition of his squad as it stands.
“(A) tough one (on Wednesday),” said Klopp.
“The season in Austria started already so they are obviously at a completely different stage to us. We will feel that. We have three days later our big starting game of the season. So, of course we will have to make changes. I’d love to say we can use all of them but now I had only a short talk with Doc Sarah and she told me, ‘He feels a little bit, he feels a little bit, he has a back (issue) and stuff like this.
“This afternoon is an important session as well; in this moment I don’t know who can take part in it. We need to have a look and we will play the game. It’s pre-season so we have to get through it and then we have to deal with it.”
On the possibility of players being deployed for closer to 90 minutes in the friendly with the Austrian champions at their Red Bull Arena, Klopp added, “That’s not a problem with the Saturday game. This pre-season we had to do slightly different and we wanted to do as well. All of them will play the first time 90 minutes on Saturday, all of them. But that’s how we did the training.”
“So the training sessions were intense to a specific point that we could get fitter and fitter. The running sessions were extremely hard but we took care of them and now let’s see how we can grow in this season. For City, it’s not really different, they came back from America probably yesterday or something like that. So it will be a tough one.”
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