Liverpool manager Jürgen Klopp will recall German goalkeeper Loris Karius for his team’s FA Cup third round tie with Plymouth Argyle after praising his countryman for his response to losing his first team place. Karius has been out of the Liverpool line up since the start of December, having been dropped by Klopp following a string of high-profile errors. The 23-year-old even found himself the centre of a national debate after he was criticised by television pundits including Gary and Phil Neville and Jamie Carragher, a fact that irritated his manager. But he will be returned to the first team, with current incumbent Simon Mignolet rested, for the visit of the League Two side to Anfield on Sunday.
“There is a big chance Loris will play,” said Klopp. “He has been training outstandingly well which is good to see. “It’s difficult to speak about these things in public because it becomes a story but we cannot ignore the pressure you make. That’s how it is, we have to cope with it, deal with it. “That is why you see I made the change and I am sure Loris will benefit from this step back, or step aside. Simon has done a really, really outstanding job for us since he’s been playing again and forced Loris to train at the highest level because we have two really good goalkeepers. It was good for him.”
Klopp will still be acutely aware that Karius’s performance in such a relatively low-profile tie is bound to come under intense scrutiny after the way in which the form of the £4.7 million summer signing has been so closely analysed during his 11-game English career to date. But the Liverpool manager is also hopeful that his own personal run of success in cup competitions in his 15 months in charge at Anfield can continue this week. Klopp led the Reds to last season’s League Cup Final, and defeat against Manchester City, before doing likewise in the Europa League, where his side was beaten by Sevilla.
This term, the German has taken Liverpool to a League Cup semi-final with Southampton, the first leg of which is next week, meaning that his only relative failure in the cup has been a fourth round replay exit to West Ham in last season’s FA Cup. “Whatever I could say is not good enough if the players don’t want it,” said Klopp of his team’s cup record. “These players want to have success, want to take every chance they get, and that has made it, up until now, really easy for me. “It’s not like I do something before cup games and say, ‘don’t forget, we have no chance to win the Premier League, let’s find another way to win!’
“We really want to win football games and up until now it has worked well. There is always an opportunity, there is always a nice chance, that is how I see it with all the competitions, with the Europa League, all the stuff we’ve played until now.” Klopp will give a number of youngsters an opportunity against Plymouth with the most likely candidates for selection defenders Joe Gomez, out with injury since October 2015, and Trent Alexander-Arnold, plus midfielder Kevin Stewart. That will allow Klopp to rest a number of key first team players who picked up relatively minor injuries during or before the holiday period, including James Milner, Jordan Henderson, Joel Matip, Daniel Sturridge and Philippe Coutinho.
