Jurgen Klopp explained why he decided to drop Darwin Nunez from Liverpool's starting line-up to face Napoli in the Champions League on Tuesday night.
Klopp chose to make four changes from the Liverpool side which was beaten 2-1 at Anfield on Saturday by Leeds. Nunez, Andy Robertson, Joe Gomez and Harvey Elliott were all dropped to the bench as the Reds boss rotated his side.
Ibrahima Konate, Kostas Tsimikas, James Milner and Curtis Jones were the beneficiaries. Konate made his second start of the season and partnered Virgil van Dijk in central defence as the Dutchman made his 200th appearance for the club.
Liverpool captain Henderson was absent entirely from the Liverpool squad for the occasion. He played the final 30 minutes of the Leeds game as a substitute, but was forced to train by himself at Liverpool's Kirkby base on Monday and was left out as a precautionary measure, with one eye on Sunday's visit to Tottenham in the Premier League.
Before the match Klopp was asked his thinking behind the team selection. He said: “It’s a great opportunity to do it because we have players coming back.
"We have to mix it up a little bit. With our striker situation, with our midfield situation. Ibou is back. Robbo came back from injury and played, Kostas is in good shape. So that was the reason for most of them, I’d say.”
Klopp also revealed that Liverpool would shift back to their more familiar 4-3-3 formation, after dabbling with a diamond midfield in recent weeks.
“We’ve played other systems quite frequently now as well and won games in them as well," he said. "We will see how it looks. For us tonight, we want to play a 4-3-3, but it’s difficult because Curtis will play on the left wing – he’s a really good footballer and can play between the lines but we also need him behind as well.
"We need to use our wings but on the other side it’s very important that we defend properly.”
