Jurgen Klopp admits more than seven Liverpool players could miss Aston Villa clash

Jurgen Klopp has confirmed that Roberto Firmino and James Milner will miss Liverpool's next two matches.

Firmino was absent from the Reds' 3-2 loss to Manchester City in the Carabao Cup. The striker has a calf issue.

Milner started at the Ethihad Stadium but suffered a hamstring problem and was fofrced off in the 38th minute.

Liverpool travel to Aston Villa on Boxing Day for their first Premier League fixture following the World Cup before Leicester City travel to Anfield on 30 December.

But Klopp admits the Reds will be without Firmino and Milner for the next 'couple of games'.

The Liverpool manager said: “Millie didn’t get better since then – he will be out for a couple of games. Same for Bobby.

“Bobby, it’s like this, he is already on the better side of it, even when it is only a few days ago, but it’s not a major thing, so we will look day by day with him."

Trent Alexander-Arnold was absent against City because of illness.

Klopp admits there is an issue going around the Liverpool camp and cannot guarantree more players will fall victim to sickness.

He added: “Ox is fine, Ox was ill, like Trent, some of the staff as well. That’s why we have to be careful in the moment, absolutely, like everybody, I think it’s going around.

“That makes planning really difficult for the next game because we were 100-per-cent clear what we want to do against City and then you have to change in the last second pretty much, that’s not cool but it’s the situation and that might happen against Aston Villa as well so we need to be flexible, stay flexible.

“Apart from that, Virg (van Dijk) trained now obviously completely normal so will be there. Trent hopefully will be better; he was not part of the full session but of parts, let’s see how that develops until tomorrow. That’s it.”

Meanwhile, Ibrahima Konate will not feature against Aston Villa. He’s been given time off after helping France reach the World Cup final.

Luis Diaz, Diogo Jota, Curtis Jones and Arthur Melo are ruled out because of injury.