Sakho is expected to be out of action for between six to eight weeks after sustaining knee ligament damage during Liverpool’s loss to Crystal Palace before the global break.
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Jamie Carragher believes Jurgen Klopp will make a new central defender one of his top priorities for Liverpool in the January transfer window – as Dejan Lovren has “never fully convinced”.
And after the Reds thrashed Manchester City 4-1 on Saturday, defender Lovren revealed how the result has given them the belief they can beat anyone.
“With Dejan there will be absolutely no problem”, said Klopp. It’s not that serious, not like we first thought. I’m really satisfied with everyone’s performance. He was brilliant on this day. “As long as these two guys are feeling good then we don’t have a big problem and Mamadou is not 20 weeks out; it will be earlier than that so that’s good for us too”. “I was working hard all the time so I’m ready and looking forward to playing”.
Klopp admits he is still evaluating the players he inherited from Brendan Rodgers and, despite being linked with a host of January signings, needs more time to decide who is, and who is not, wanted for the long term.
One of Sakho’s great strengths, his passing accuracy (91%), is an area where Lovren will need to improve in order to prove his worth.
The busy schedule will test the Reds’ squad to its limits, with injuries already hurting the number of players available to Klopp, but he believes having fixtures so regularly will help him to form a strong judgement on his players.
He added that the club “have the possibilities” to “change a few things” in the window half-way through the season, as well as the summer window, but insisted they have “made no decisions” thus far because they “don’t have to make them yet”.
“We are running now more than ever, more than any other team in the Premier League”. We don’t want to give you a time.
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“He trained with us, of course he’s not 100 percent and now we have to see”. But at this moment, there’s no decision.
