Arne Slot has confirmed Giovanni Leoni will miss the rest of the season after tearing an anterior cruciate ligament on his Liverpool debut.
The 18-year-old central defender, signed from Parma last month for £26m, sustained the injury towards the end of an assured performance against Southampton in the Carabao Cup on Tuesday and immediate concerns over a lengthy layoff have been realised. Leoni, recently called up to the Italy squad for the first time, faces surgery and an extensive rehabilitation period.
“He is not in a good place, of course, because he tore his ACL and it means he will be out for around a year,” said Slot on Friday. “Being so young, coming to a new country and playing so well in your first game … it’s very hard to take the positive side. There’s never a positive side but he is still so young so he has many years to go after he recovers from a terrible injury like that.”
Liverpool agreed a deal to sign Marc Guéhi from Crystal Palace on deadline day only for the Palace chair, Steve Parish, to abort the transfer under pressure from his manager, Oliver Glasner. Leoni’s absence may increase the likelihood of the Premier League champions making another move for the Palace captain in January. Slot, whose league leaders travel to Selhurst Park on Saturday, was noncommittal on whether he could play the rest of the season with three specialist central defenders but insisted he did not want a bloated squad.
“That all depends on whether we get more injuries and if there’s a chance in the market,” said Slot on the prospect of January reinforcements. “But I would not prefer to go to 24, 25 players. If there is a situation – and touch wood there isn’t – where I lead a team that has four or five injuries throughout the whole season, then it might be smarter to go to 24, 25. But recent history with Feyenoord and last season as well showed that we have a good record until now.
“That is a certain risk. If we have five or six injuries at the same time then we would end up with 15, 16 players and that would normally be difficult. So it’s a choice I like to make but I think it is also a financial choice that we as a club have to make. If we want to keep these top players, we cannot have 24, 25 of them.”
Slot confirmed that Liverpool intended to add Federico Chiesa to their squad list for the Champions League’s league phase after Leoni’s injury. New Uefa rules allow an outfield player unavailable for 60 days or more to be replaced.
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Hugo Ekitiké has not been fined for the red card against Southampton that means he misses the trip to Palace. The forward received a second booking for taking off his shirt after scoring. Slot said of disciplining him: “I spoke to him but if disciplined means a fine then, no, he didn’t get that. It wasn’t smart what he did. He recognised that straight away and said sorry to his teammates. You are allowed at this club to make a mistake without immediately getting fined.”
