Isak sustains groin injury to extend his tough start to Liverpool career after British-record move

It was the second injury on the night for Liverpool, with right back Jeremie Frimpong having already come off midway through the first half because of a hamstring problem.

Isak has been building up his match sharpness in the last few weeks, after training away from the main Newcastle squad in preseason while agitating for the move to Liverpool. He has scored just one goal in eight games in all competitions for his new club.

Liverpool manager Arne Slot said last week that only now could Isak be fairly judged, given the player's turbulent preseason.

“Let’s hope it’s not that bad, but he had to go off because he felt his groin,” Slot said. “Many people wanted me to play him more and we had to find the balance and unfortunately today that balance didn’t work out for us perfectly. But let’s hope for the best."

Slot spoke about the difficulty in managing Isak's playing time over the past month, and said the fact that the striker played twice for Sweden in the recent international window strengthened the belief he was ready to string together starts.

“When he came to the club, he had hardly trained," the Dutchman said. "So you bring him step by step forward, and then you feel there must be a moment where he can play twice a week, and the first time we try — he did it with Sweden as well — he has to go off.

“Normally you try to prepare players for once-a-week football, but if you are Liverpool you play every three days or normally three times in eight days but we’ve been unfortunate this season, we have to play three times in seven days.

"We’ve tried to prepare him for that, we were really careful, and he was perfectly fit when he came back from the national team before the (Manchester) United game on Sunday. We thought he was well prepared for that but the margins at the top are small."

Frimpong has also endured a stop-start campaign in his first season at Liverpool after joining from Bayer Leverkusen.

Slot said the Netherlands international would be out for a “few weeks."

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