Mohamed Salah could return to Liverpool training soon: Why Jurgen Klopp needs him to win a quadruple

The matches are coming thick and fast for Liverpool’s and their depth is being tested, but it could be receiving a boost as Jurgen Klopp is hopeful that Mohamed Salah will return to training next week. The Red’s talisman, Salah has been absent since mid-January. Initially he was on Africa Cup of Nations duty with Egypt, but that absence has been extended due to picking up a hamstring injury during the tournament. Salah has 14 goals and eight assists in only 20 league matches played, but his presence could be critical to giving Klopp a proper send off in his final season as Liverpool boss by hoisting a title in front of the Anfield faithful.

“Mo is going in the right direction, we hope, but we don’t know, that he can be a part of part of training next week,” Klopp said. “But we have to see. He is going through all the paces now and it looks positive. It’s either next week or the week after. If you ask him, it’s next week.”

That timetable of naming two different weeks is critical for the Reds as they’ll face an absolute gauntlet of matches as the Reds compete in four different competitions. February will see them play in the Premier League, EFL Cup final, FA Cup and then March sees them return to Europa League play.

Liverpool’s upcoming schedule

While Liverpool has been mostly fine without Salah, their loss to Arsenal does show that they still need the Egyptian for the bigger games on their schedule. As the matches get more compressed, only relying on Diogo Jota, Darwin Nunez, Luis Diaz, and Cody Gakpo will increase the injury risk for the quartet when Klopp needs to rotate his team as much as possible. Without Thiago and Dominik Szoboszlai in midfield, Klopp already has important rotation questions to consider.

Playing a match every three days, something will have to give. The longer that Liverpool spend without Salah, the longer that more will be asked from the rest of the attack. Young players like Conor Bradley have been integrated, which helps, but this is a time of the year during which injuries can pile up and only leading the Premier League by two points, Liverpool don’t have much margin for error, especially when they get out of the above gauntlet to face Manchester City on March 10.

Usually, facing Burnley and Luton Town would be prime moments for rotation, but when the Hatters have scored four goals in back-to-back matches, nothing can be taken for granted. What’s most important is the match in front of them, but with so much on the horizon, it’s only natural to ponder how long Liverpool can continue this quadruple challenge without Salah if his return to training isn’t sooner rather than later.