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Jurgen Klopp is confident Trent Alexander-Arnold will be fit for Liverpool’s potentially pivotal trip to Manchester City next weekend.
Reds right-back Alexander-Arnold sustained a hamstring injury last month that ruled him out of the FA Cup win at Nottingham Forest and England’s two international friendlies.
Reports earlier this week claimed Alexander-Arnold was back in full training on Wednesday, suggesting he was likely to feature against Watford on Saturday.
Klopp dismissed those claims when addressing the media on Friday, claiming the 23-year-old only fully re-joined the rest of the squad earlier that day, only committing to it being “possible” that he plays on Saturday.
But any worries about the influential full-back missing the trip to City next Sunday – in what is being billed as a potential Premier League title decider – have seemingly been put to bed.
He told reporters: “Trent trained yesterday [Thursday] in parts and is in full training today.
“We will see what we do with that. Trent wanted to play for England, just to make sure everyone knows that, but he couldn’t.
“The scans showed he could not go anywhere but sometimes injuries are not that serious and you are not out for five or six weeks, it’s two weeks for Trent. It’s tight for tomorrow, but possible.
“It depends what he does in team training. He was with the rehab and fitness department before, it was really intense what he did before with us, he should be fine. I’ll make the decision.”
Asked if will be ready for the midweek trip to Benfica in the Champions League, Klopp added: “I think so.”
As such, Liverpool should be able to count on his services away to City in what is surely the Reds’ biggest game of the season.
That will be a major boost given Alexander-Arnold’s significant influence as a creative hub for Liverpool, even from right-back.
Only Alisson and Virgil van Dijk (both 2,430) have played more Premier League minutes for Liverpool than Alexander-Arnold (2,313) this term, while he leads the way for total chances created (77) in the squad.
Only Mohamed Salah (51) can better his 42 chances created in open play, though Alexander-Arnold’s 11 assists is a Liverpool high.
In fact, his 10.9 expected assists (xA) shows that his goal creation comes from incredible creative reliability, rather than him benefiting from especially exceptional finishing – no one else in the Liverpool group has more than 5.6 xA this season.
