Liverpool Dealt Injury Blow Ahead Of Arsenal Game With Star Ruled Out For 2 Months

Liverpool have been dealt a huge injury blow ahead of their season opener against Arsenal with Loris Karius facing up to two months on the sidelines with a hand injury, according to the Telegraph.

Karius had set his sights on replacing Simon Mignolet as Liverpool’s No.1 after sealing a £4.7million move to Anfield from German side Mainz back in May.

The 23-year-old has started ahead of the Belgian international in the Reds pre-season games so far but his progress has now come to an abrupt halt following an unfortunate injury.

The Telegraph claim that Karius has suffered a broken bone in his hand and has now left Liverpool’s training back in Palo Alto to fly back home to England.

The German keeper suffered the injury following a collision with Dejan Lovren during the Reds defeat to Chelsea in the International Champions Cup on Wednesday night.

Karius will now require an operation and the newspaper says he’s expected to be out for between eight to ten weeks meaning he could miss at least the first six Premier League games of the new season.

The stopper is certain to miss Liverpool’s season opener against Arsenal when they travel to the Emirates on August 14th and he’ll also sit out further games against Burnley, Tottenham, Leicester, Chelsea and Hull.

Should Karius miss the full ten weeks, then he may also sit out the trip to Swansea at the start of October but he could return for Liverpool’s huge clash with Manchester United at Anfield on the 15th.

Jurgen Klopp will now have no choice but to stick with Mignolet for the opening stages of the new campaign and the Belgian is set to step-up his pre-season preparations with friendlies against AC Milan, Roma, Barcelona and Mainz before the big kick off against Arsenal.