Liverpool Manager Jürgen Klopp explains explains why Mohamed Salah couldn’t start for Liverpool against Man City
Sparta Prague lost 5–1 to Barcelona on Thursday in the last 16 of the Europa League, and Konate left the game early in the second half. He has not been added to the group for this afternoon’s game. Jarell Quansah takes his place and starts with leader Virgil van Dijk.
Andy Robertson and fellow left back Kostas Tsimikas start on the bench, while Joe Gomez starts on the left side of defence. Conor Bradley starts on the right.
And Wataru Endo is still the holding midfielder. Alexis Mac Allister and Dominik Szoboszlai play the “No. 8” roles further forward.
Because Konate isn’t there, Jurgen Klopp will be missing up to 10 first-team players for the important game against City. Not able to play are also Alisson Becker, Joel Matip, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Curtis Jones, Ryan Gravenberch, Thiago Alcantara, Diogo Jota, Ben Doak, and Stefan Bajcetic.
Klopp, the manager of Liverpool, said that the Reds “didn’t consider” using Salah from the start because of his recent injury issues.
He told Sky Sports, “We didn’t even think about letting him start the game.” We can get smarter. Mo didn’t come back too soon the last time; he just had some bad luck with the setback. As you can guess, we’ve talked to Mo about that. He or I did not choose to start him today. The game will be tough, and we can bring him on, which is great, but it wasn’t a big deal.
Klopp’s team is made up of Kelleher, Bradley, Quansah, Van Dijk, Gomez, Endo, Szoboszlai, Mac Allister, Elliott, Nunez, and Diaz.
