Trent Alexander-Arnold decision imminent as Jurgen Klopp reveals improvement to Liverpool injury list

Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp was upbeat about the chances of several injured players returning for the Reds, though revealed a couple would face a late decision over whether they played against Norwich City in the FA Cup fourth round on Sunday or had to wait until next week for a comeback.

Having beaten Fulham on aggregate on Tuesday night, the Anfield club are through to the Carabao Cup final once more and now turn their attention to the other domestic cup, hoping to repeat their exploits of two years ago when they won both competitions.

But as they are also in the hunt for Premier League and Europa League honours, Klopp will need his full squad available if he’s to maintain a strong lineup in every competition - and so the impending returns of Trent Alexander-Arnold and Dominik Szoboszlai in particular are key across the coming games.

Andy Robertson, meanwhile, should be in line for action against the Canaries after being an unused sub against Fulham.

“There’s a chance for all of them but we’ll have to see,” Klopp said in his pre-match press conference. “Robbo is physically ready and it was good to be in a matchday squad, he’s completely in a normal team training schedule. Dom is too from tomorrow on; he had a session yesterday. That means he’s ready for minutes.

“With Trent, is it going to be Norwich or the game after? We’ll see - he wasn’t in parts of team training yet so we have to make a decision there. It would be very helpful if they could all be involved but we’ll have to see.”

While that trio could return soon, the prognosis remains unclear for Spanish duo Thiago and Stefan Bajcetic, while Kostas Tsimikas is fit to return, but “he just has to wait for the green light because the bone takes much longer” to be ready for contact action than the plate he has had inserted.

Klopp also reiterated that the club had taken the decision to help Mohamed Salah back to full fitness on Merseyside in consultation with the forward himself and his national team, who are in action at the Africa Cup of Nations, where the club’s top scorer this season picked up his hamstring strain.

“Most people in Egypt understand the situation because we have exactly the same target: Make Mo as fit as possible as quickly as possible. That’s how it is. If a player is injured we try everything to get them back,” Klopp said.

“All parts agreed that he needs to do his rehab here and that’s what we’re doing now. We have a season to play so we want him fit but if he’s fit earlier, as long as Egypt are in the tournament he’ll go back. That’s clear, win-win.”

After hosting Norwich, Liverpool play Chelsea, Arsenal, Burnley and Brentford in the Premier League before their Carabao Cup final against the Blues one month from now.