Joe Gomez injured on worldwide duty

Gomez was forced off during the final stages of England Under-21′s 3-0 victory over Kazakhstan last night after picking up a knee injury.

Jurgen Klopp has been dealt the first blow of his Liverpool tenure with the news that Joe Gomez is expected to miss the rest of the season with a suspected cruciate injury.

However, the severity of the problem emerged when he returned to Melwood, Liverpool’s training ground, on Wendesday.

After arriving from Charlton, Gomez went straight into the Liverpool starting line-up, starting their first five league games of the campaign.

After he was withdrawn during the 2-1 win over Kazakhstan, England U-21 manager Gareth Southgate initially played down the injury.

Liverpool are already without Jordan Henderson (foot), Roberto Firmino (back) and Jon Flanagan (knee), while there are also question marks over the fitness of Philippe Coutinho (groin) and Dejan Lovren (ankle).

The 18-year-old returned to Merseyside on Wednesday to undergo scans with the club’s medical team, who discovered that Gomez had discovered significantly more extensive damage to his ACL than Southgate had stated.

Liverpool are now lying tenth in the Premier League standings, having collected 12 points from their eight league games so far.