Liverpool defender Virgil van Dijk faces “more than a month” on the sidelines with a hamstring drawback, supervisor Jurgen Klopp mentioned on Friday. The 19-time English champions are at the moment 16 factors behind Premier League leaders Arsenal and 7 factors exterior the highest 4. The Dutch defender, 31, who suffered the harm in Monday’s 3-1 defeat to Brentford, will doubtless miss Premier League matches in opposition to Brighton, Chelsea and Wolves. He faces a race to be match for the Merseyside derby on February 13 and the Champions League last-16 first leg at dwelling to Real Madrid the next week.

“It is a surprise for us and obviously a big blow,” Klopp mentioned on the eve of his workforce’s FA Cup third-round tie in opposition to Wolves.

“The diagnosis was pretty harsh and we talk about weeks, more than a month, but I hope it goes quick. He never had an issue with muscles before and it just now happened. It was one sprint too much in that moment.”

Van Dijk’s compatriot Cody Gakpo, whose switch from PSV Eindhoven was finalised this week following a formidable World Cup, might make his debut for Liverpool on Saturday.

“I’m very positive about him,” mentioned Klopp. “Cody gets the same amount of time like each player. You have to settle in offensively, it’s not that easy. He comes in from a different league. That’s always difficult.”

He added: “Of course with our situation, injuries to the strikers as well, it’s really nice to have a player who is pretty natural in a lot of things in the offensive part of the game and knows where the goal stands.

“He is clearly filled with pleasure, having fun with every second within the second. That is superb. He appears to be like actually good, actually promising.”

(This story has not been edited by NDTV employees and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

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