Liverpool journalist Joel Rabinowitz has been sharing his thoughts on Reds midfielder Thiago Alcantara and his absences from recent matches.
This comes after Rabinowitz recently made an appearance on the Liverpool Echo’s Blood Red Podcast where he discussed a variety of topics concerning the Merseyside club.
Thiago has only featured occasionally for Liverpool in all competitions so far this season, with his last appearance coming in last month’s Merseyside derby.
On the topic of Thiago and his recent absences for the club, Rabinowitz had this to say on the matter.
He said: “[I’m] starting to question whether we actually signed him at all at this point after spending all summer obsessing about him, talking about him, writing about him every single week and he’s just disappeared off the face of the earth.
“No pictures, no videos, he was supposed to be doing a Q&A a couple of weeks ago, which hasn’t happened. No updates about him being in training, which is supposed to have happened by now, I think. I don’t know, really – it’s funny, the way Klopp was speaking about it after the Everton game when he obviously had that horrific challenge by Richarlison, he didn’t really rule him out for a specific period of time, I think he almost left it open as in he could have been involved against Ajax or Sheffield United or one of those games around then.
“He hadn’t definitively ruled him out for being back for those games and then there was a period I think in late October, when we saw some pictures of him doing individual training at Melwood – not as part of a team, but just sort of running by himself.
“All the word and from what you saw of the tackle, it was just an impact injury, really bad studs-up on the knee so it seemed like bruising, nothing kind of severe in terms of ligament damage or anything like that, so it is a strange one.”
Liverpool signed Thiago from German club Bayern Munich back in September for a fee of £19.8 million. Since then, the Spaniard has only made two appearances for the Reds, which both came in the Premier League earlier in the season.
The midfielder missed Liverpool’s 3-1 win over Arsenal and was then ruled out of their 7-2 defeat to Aston Villa due to being in self-isolation. After playing the full 90 minutes in Liverpool’s 2-2 draw with Everton, Thiago has not featured for the club since, with Transfermarkt claiming he has been out with a knee injury.
According to the Liverpool Echo, Thiago, who is currently valued at £43.2 million, was not seen during the club’s recent training session at their new training facility.
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TIF Thoughts on Joel Rabinowitz’s comments on Thiago…
Given how Thiago hasn’t featured for Liverpool for over a month now, it’s understandable why Rabinowitz is starting to question just what is wrong with the midfield man.
With Thiago’s two performances in the Premier League so far this season earning him a respectable season rating of 6.8/10 (as per WhoScored), this shows that he can be a useful player for Liverpool when he is available.
Hopefully, Thiago can recover from his apparent knee injury and get back into the Liverpool squad as soon as possible and show what he can do for the team on the pitch.