Slot has pointed out that Liverpool had to face Brighton without the injured Alisson Becker and Mohamed Salah, and says he is unsure when the former will be back, but he has somewhat allayed fears over Ekitike’s lay-off.
He added: “Alisson will definitely be out during the international break and let’s see afterwards. Hugo, I think he could play tomorrow if he needed to. It was a dead leg, as you call it here I think. Brighton did what we expected. If you face a team that has only had 62 hours of rest and the first thing you do is make it an intense game, play the first duels, play tough duels – nothing wrong with the duels, by the way – but unfortunately it was a collision and that led to Hugo going out. Yeah, that’s not helpful after two minutes.
“You have to continue without one of the best strikers that the league has seen in the last three or four years already not available throughout the whole season, Alexander Isak. One of the best goalscorers the league has seen in the last eight years not being available with Mo Salah. And then missing out on Hugo Ekitike, who has had a lot of impact this season, him being out.
“And then as so many [times] this season you have to find a way of playing players in positions they are maybe not used to and in the first half I think we did this quite well. But as the game went on, Brighton became stronger and stronger. A few times this season we were able to maybe let something happen off the bench. Rio [Ngumoha] had a few very nice actions but throughout the second half I think they were closer scoring the 3-1 than we were scoring the 2-2.”
