Arne Slot says Liverpool will continue to tread carefully with Diogo Jota following his return to action from a chest injury.
The Portugal international scored on his comeback off the bench against Fulham earlier this month after nearly two months on the sidelines.
Jota has since made a further three substitute appearances for the Premier League leaders with Slot starting either Luis Diaz or Darwin Nunez as the central attacker.
“We are still managing his fitness,” Slot said. “Diogo has been out for quite a long time and he couldn’t train that much. Sometimes, if a player has an injury, he can do a lot, but he couldn’t do a lot for quite a long time.
“Since this league is so intense, it’s not so easy with two months out to come in and play from the start again. You need to have some minutes to build this up and he is in competition with some other special players as well who are, at this moment, also on top of their game.
“He is gradually building it up and I think he comes close to starting a game, but he has competition in his position as well.”
After replacing Nunez with 12 minutes left of Thursday’s 3-1 win over Leicester City, Jota will be hoping to play a bigger role away to West Ham United on Sunday.
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Slot had planned to recall Dominik Szoboszlai to his starting line up at the London Stadium but the Hungary international midfielder will serve a one-match ban after collecting his fifth booking of the season after coming on against Leicester.
“Dominik Szoboszlai was outstanding against Tottenham and the idea was that he should be outstanding against West Ham too, but he is not available so someone else should be outstanding against West Ham instead,” Slot added.
Ibrahima Konate (knee) and Conor Bradley (hamstring) remain the only two players sidelined by injury and Slot expects to have them back in action in January.
Asked if either of them had any chance of being back for the visit of Manchester United to Anfield on January 5, Slot said: “They will not be back for West Ham United. Then there is a week in between. Let’s see how close they are then.
“It is difficult to tell you at this moment because they don’t train with the group yet. Hopefully in the upcoming days they come closer to that situation.
“But then again, Ibou has been out for five or six weeks maybe, Conor just as long, and they are in competition with players who are completely fit and doing really well so I have to make the right judgement the moment they are back with the team.”
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(Oli Scarff/AFP via Getty Images)
