Saturday, January 01, 2022
Corona outbreak near Liverpool
Now the virus has also caught Klopp
Omikron is raging in England. For some time now, the virus variant has been causing difficulties for the most popular soccer league in the world. 18 games have already been postponed due to the high number of infections. Now Liverpool coach Jürgen Klopp has to be in quarantine.
Jürgen Klopp, the German coach of Liverpool FC, has gone into isolation because of a suspected corona infection. He will be his club in the top game of the Premier League on Sunday (5.30 p.m. / Sky) at Chelsea FC. This is announced by the traditional English club. The 54-year-old has “mild symptoms” and will be represented at the Chelsea game by his assistant Pepijn Lijnders. According to the usually well-informed US broadcaster ESPN, Klopp should otherwise be fine.
While all players tested negative, tests with three other club employees showed abnormalities, the English champions from 2020 further announced in the statement. It was only on Friday that Liverpool announced three more corona cases within the team. Klopp did not mention the names of those affected. The former Dortmund coach had vehemently pointed out the dangers of the corona virus in the past few weeks and criticized the league officials. “It’s like a morning lottery waiting for the result. It’s not that cool at the moment,” Klopp had said.
Despite the infections within the squad, Liverpool have not yet asked for the game against Chelsea to be postponed. For both teams, the game after Manchester City’s flattering 2-1 win at Arsenal is already about everything. The loser of the game will be more than ten points behind Pep Guardiola’s team after a little more than half of the season.
A total of 18 English Premier League games have been postponed to a later date within the past three weeks due to the high number of infections within the squad. This also affected the Liverpool home game against Leeds United, among other things. Coach Marcelo Bielsa had not even been able to nominate 14 professional players.