Three Liverpool players have left their respective international squads and are returning to Merseyside earlier than originally anticipated.
Such news would normally be as a result of injuries, but in this instance none of the trio in question picked up a knock while away with their national teams.
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Liverpool trio return to Merseyside earlier than expected
In Mo Salah’s case, it’s actually to prevent the possiblity of an injury, with the Daily Mail reporting that the 32-year-old was given permission to leave the Egypt camp by Pharaohs boss Hossam Hassan so that he wouldn’t have to play on a much-derided artifical surface in Mauritania on Tuesday.
Virgil van Dijk is also returning to Liverpool ahead of schedule after his red card for Netherlands against Hungary last night ruled him out of their UEFA Nations League clash away to Germany on Monday, with the Reds captain now back on Merseyside (Daily Mail).
Another player leaving his national team prematurely is Curtis Jones, who’ll have to wait another bit longer to make his senior England debut after he pulled of the Three Lions camp due to a personal matter, as confirmed by the official LFC website.
Slot will be glad to have them back early
If Arne Slot was told at the start of this week that three Liverpool players would’ve left their national teams by Saturday, he’d probably have winced at the thought of injuries decimating his squad ahead of a hugely challenging run of fixtures over the next month.
Instead, with none of the aforementioned trio incurring any physical knocks, the news actually comes as a massive boost for the Reds as they prepare to face Chelsea in eight days’ time.
Salah and Van Dijk will have a full week at the AXA Training Centre to gear up for that clash and our subsequent fixtures, while hopefully the personal matter which prompted Jones to leave the England camp is nothing malign.
With a number of their Liverpool teammates still in international action over the next four days, keep those fingers crossed that everyone makes it back to Merseyside without any injury concerns which’d curtail their involvement at club level!
