Liverpool face another international break headache in a couple of weeks, with Alisson and Fabinho called up for Brazil – meaning they’ll miss games afterwards for the Reds.
Last month, neither Alisson nor Fabinho went away with the Selecao due to concerns over the fact they’d have to miss a number of fixtures upon their return, due to Brazil and other nations being on England’s red list.
That led to the threat of Premier League players not being allowed to feature the following weekend and it was only the day before matches took place that most were cleared for action, amid threats Brazil would invoke an international ruling.
Ultimately, they did return to action, but neither clubs, players nor the international associations want the same issues this time around.
The hope from Jurgen Klopp is that the UK government come up with a feasible workaround – although he also pointed out a massive scheduling issue which still leaves Fabinho and Alisson a doubt for the Reds’ first match back on October 16.
“There must be a solution, because we cannot just leave it like this and say ‘it’s not a problem’ – yes it is a problem,” he told reporters.
“The decisive people are working on that but there’s nothing decided yet as far as I’m concerned.
“On top of that…we have anyway a problem with the Brazilians – I expect that they will go to the internationals – we have a 12.30pm kickoff at Watford [on Saturday] and I’m not sure if the game in Brazil is Friday night at 1.30am, it’s around 30-something hours after [the Watford game].
“Obviously nobody thought about that yet. I know it’s a Liverpool problem, nobody else’s problem, so good for Watford and all these kinds of things.
“I just don’t know how you can do these kinds of things that nobody reacts on the schedule.
“So we have two problems, one is the schedule: TV and other guys, they’re just ‘OK, that’s how it is, they have to play’.
“But let’s have a look at how they can sort that? Another thing not good for the players, just to tell, and not good for the clubs either.
“And on top of that now I hope the government comes up with any kind of solution [for quarantine].”
Meanwhile, Klopp addressed the prospect of Joe Gomez returning to England duty and stated it would be a great boost for the centre-back if he was called up – and there was no concerns on the injury front if he has the additional game time.
“If he gets invited I have no problems with that. He needs to train and play definitely,” he said.
“I tried to be careful and sensible with the centre-half situation so far, we know the three boys had big injuries, we have to react to that.
“They need to get rhythm all of them, that’s what we try to give them, but we need to win football games too.”
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