LFC injuries update and possible lineup vs Brentford

Although Virgil van Dijk acknowledged that Liverpool still has “so much improvement to come,” he believes this is “totally normal” at this point.

Liverpool is within striking distance of the league leaders after 11 Premier League games played, having amassed 24 points thus far. However, the past week has been disappointing.

In order for his team to recover from a contentious midweek loss, Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp will be anxious to have Virgil van Dijk fit for their Premier League match this weekend against Brentford.

With a 3-2 loss to Toulouse in Ligue 1, the Reds’ hopes of qualifying for the knockout stages were dashed. They had previously gone undefeated in this year’s Europa League. Before Thijs Dallinga doubled the score the other side of halftime, Aron Donnum had given the hosts the lead in the first half.

Cristian Casseres’ amazing own goal gave Klopp’s team hope for a comeback, but Frank Magri’s strike two minutes later all but ended it. Fantastic solo by Diogo Jota in the 89th minute run once again gave rise to the possibility of a further twist, which appeared to have materialized in the 97th minute when youthful player Jarell Quansah scored a scruffy goal.

“They [Toulouse] won pretty much all the decisive challenges. There were too many situations where we should have won the ball and didn’t, and on top of that we gave the ball away easily at least twice, once for the first goal and the other for a disallowed goal, on the counter-attack our last line was too deep, defending wise was just not good enough.

“When you concede three goals, you need to score a lot of goals to still win. Obviously that nearly happened that we got a point. That would have made the game better and would have felt better in the table. But we have to accept it. It was deserved. We were intense, we threw everything in, but the problem is in a football game you have to do the decisive things right in the right moment.

“We cannot concede the goals we conceded. The first goal, that can happen, but in the second half, in similar situations, we were completely open, the last line too deep, counter-attack. They scored five goals, two disallowed, and that’s obviously not good. The result is the opposite of good and the performance was just not good enough.

“I’m not concerned – just see it, now we have to change it and we will, definitely. I just want that we accept it, a little bit. I would have loved to get the point – the performance wouldn’t have been better, but we’d have a point – but I would have said exactly the same thing. We have to be better in these moments, 100%.”

The Reds were travelling without Van Dijk, who had been left out of the squad despite featuring in the 1-1 draw against Luton Town over the weekend. With Curtis Jones and Ryan Gravenberch also left out, many have been concerned about whether the trio will be available for the clash with the Bees.

Will Virgil van Dijk be fit to face Brentford in gameweek 12?

The short answer at this stage is that we don’t know. The star has been named in the Netherlands squad for the upcoming international break, lending some credence to the hope that he’ll be fit enough to get at least a cameo appearance if not a full 90 minutes – having played a full 90 for the past six league matches.