Liverpool face an anxious wait to discover if captain Jordan Henderson will miss a key period of their season after he suffered a hamstring injury.
The 29-year-old was substituted during Tuesday’s 1-0 defeat by Atletico Madrid and was limping when he left the stadium. Liverpool stayed overnight in Spain, but Henderson felt sore yesterday morning before the flight home.
How long Henderson is out will become clear after a scan today, but Liverpool are already resigned to him missing Monday night’s clash with West Ham. They face a busy spell in the coming weeks, with Premier League fixtures against Watford and Bournemouth sandwiching the FA Cup fifth-round match at Chelsea, as well as the home leg of their last-16 Champions League tie against Atletico on March 11.
Whether Henderson is absent for one game or more, it will be a major blow for Jurgen Klopp because his skipper has been in outstanding form over the past four months and is favourite to be named PFA Player of the Year. Liverpool, for once, failed to come up with answers to the test Atletico set them on Tuesday and losing a big game is not a feeling the squad have been familiar with over the past 12 months.
The one-goal deficit, however, is hardly beyond retrieval.
‘It’s going to be a difficult game,’ said defender Virgil van Dijk when asked to assess Liverpool’s prospects of turning things around in the second leg.
‘But we should be confident. We can’t let this defeat bring us down in any way at all. We’re never happy with losing.
‘It’s been a while, as well, but we have to believe in ourselves like we always do. We’re frustrated we lost but still have another 90 minutes.
‘We have to be patient, but Atletico have shown over the last couple of years that it’s very difficult to score goals and break them down.
‘They got help from the fans; their manager was fired up with them. We expected it. But it started with the goal we conceded. We gave them something to hold on to.’