Daniel Sturridge and Jordan Henderson will not be a part of the Liverpool squad to face Stoke City in the first leg of the Capital One Cup semifinals on Tuesday.
Henderson missed the 2-0 loss to West Ham United on Saturday after a recurrence of the heel problem which kept the Liverpool skipper out for several months. The heel injury has still not healed for Henderson to even start training, and Jurgen Klopp revealed it will take the midfielder time to return, even if the latest setback might be a blessing in disguise, as it might help him overcome the problem which has caused so many issues of late.
"We don't really know [when Henderson can return] because we have to wait each day, each hour, each minute," Klopp said. "The thing that happened with the tendon in the foot, it's good. It's painful but it's good.
"We hope that when the blood is out of the foot then the situation is solved but in this moment there is blood around the heel so it's not possible to train or to play. We hope it's not serious and we don't have to wait because we cannot do more. He's having treatment and, everything we can do to bring the blood out of the foot, we are doing.
"But we cannot rush more, it's time we need."
There was hope of a Sturridge return after Klopp revealed last week the striker was back in training. However, considering the England international's injury record, Klopp is mindful of rushing Sturridge back to the first team fold, and will only consider him for selection once he undergoes several training sessions in a row.
"Daniel had some problems in these weeks, not serious, but then he could not make the next session and we had to wait a day or something like this," Klopp said of Sturridge's progress. "[It's] how a preseason can be. It's a preseason without games so it should not happen too much but some little things happened, we always have to handle this.
"It's not a row of sessions and now we are here. I'm the first who will pick him when he's available, when he's ready for this, I will never hold him back. In this moment because he didn't have one session with the team, which was the usual plan for this week, he's not available.
"What we are trying to do now is to fill his body with energy and strength and everything, that's what we have to do."
James Milner was back in training for Liverpool, but it remains to be seen if Klopp, who said he cannot rotate his squad too much owing to a lack of options, will take a risk with the midfielder.
Stoke City manager Mark Hughes does not have too many injury worries, with the manager also able to call on the services of Geoff Cameron, who successfully appealed against the hash red card shown in the 2-1 defeat to West Brom in the English Premier League at the weekend.
The likes of Jonathan Walters, Marco Van Ginkel, Charlie Adam and Joselu, though, will hope for an inclusion from the off in this crucial semifinal first leg.
Expected lineups: Stoke City: Butland; Johnson, Shawcross, Wollscheid, Pieters; Van Ginkel, Whelan; Shaqiri, Afellay, Bojan; Arnautovic.
Liverpool: Mignolet; Clyne, Lovren, Sakho; Moreno; Lucas, Can; Lallana, Firmino, Coutinho; Benteke.
