As expected, Arsenal – Liverpool, scheduled for Thursday evening in London, is postponed. As the Reds were due to move onto Arsenal’s lawn in the English League Cup semi-final first leg, they requested a postponement of the meeting on Tuesday due to a growing number of positive Covid cases -19 and the unavailability of players.
The latest series of tests conducted by the club had indeed revealed a “significant” number of new cases, including assistant coach Pepijn Lijnders who was already replacing Jürgen Klopp, himself infected last week, leaving the team “with an insufficient number of players available to play the game ”.
Alisson, Roberto Firmino and Joel Matip have all contracted the virus in recent days, while Mohamed Salah, Sadio Mané and Naby Keita are betting at CAN with their respective selection. Training on Tuesday was canceled and all club facilities closed. The doors might remain closed for 48 hours, according to the newspaper “The Athletic”.
This postponement will add a little more to an overloaded calendar already upset by the postponement of several league meetings, including one already for Liverpool, once morest Leeds. The return match between Arsenal and the Reds, in the League Cup, is still scheduled for January 13.
Liverpool coach Jürgen Klopp and Tottenham counterpart Antonio Conte have pleaded for a one-game reduction in the English League Cup semi-finals Liverpool – Arsenal and Tottenham – Chelsea in order to unblock the schedule. Last year, these semi-finals were reduced to a single meeting due to the pandemic.