Mohamed Salah to return to Liverpool for treatment on injury

The 31-year-old pulled up during his side's 2-2 draw with Ghana in last Thursday's group encounter, coming off the field on the stroke of half time with a posterior muscular strain.

Egypt head coach Rui Vitoria sought to play down fears of a layoff for Salah straight after the game, although Reds boss Jurgen Klopp was none the wiser about the severity of his issue when questioned in last Friday's press conference.

It was soon confirmed that Salah would sit out Egypt's closing Group B encounter with section leaders Cape Verde, where Vitoria's men need to win to ensure a second-placed finish and a guaranteed place in the knockout stages.

The ex-Chelsea and Roma man had little to say on his injury when questioned ahead of Egypt's crunch clash on Monday, but he was swiftly ruled out of the clash and will soon fly back to England to undergo further treatment.

While Salah will be forced to miss any potential last-16 or quarter-final ties at the AFCON, there is hope that the winger could be fit enough to participate in the semi-finals, which take place on February 7.

Should Egypt progress as far as the last four, they are guaranteed to be in action in either the final on February 11 or the third-placed playoff, which takes place the day before the showpiece event.

"After additional examinations were conducted on Mohamed Salah during the last hours, and after communication between the national team's medical staff and his counterpart at Liverpool FC, it was decided that the player will return to England after the Cape Verde match tomorrow to complete his treatment, with the hope that he will join the national team in the semi-final of the AFCON if we qualify," the Egypt FA said in a statement.

Salah joins a lengthy list of Liverpool players already recuperating from injuries, including Joel Matip, Thiago Alcantara, Stefan Bajcetic, Ben Doak, Dominik Szoboszlai, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Andrew Robertson and Kostas Tsimikas, while Wataru Endo is still away with Japan at the Asian Cup.

Even with nine players out of contention through injury or international commitments, Klopp's men made light work of Bournemouth on Sunday evening, prevailing 4-0 to open up a five-point lead at the summit of the Premier League table.

Despite entering the break without anything to show for their efforts, the floodgates opened in the second period for Liverpool, as Diogo Jota and Darwin Nunez both made the net bulge twice at the Vitality Stadium.

While Klopp was delighted with his side's second-half mauling of the Cherries, he admitted that the first 45 minutes left a lot to be desired, telling BBC Match of the Day: "I'm more happy after the first half because it was a tough one. We didn't play good football. The message at half-time was that it's still 0-0 so let's try to be great and the boys were.

"People might write a story about the half-time changes working again, you can write as well about why you have the first line up from the beginning.

"It was obvious we needed to change something. We did and it worked much better. Everything was better, counter press is better, we put them really under pressure and we scored some beautiful goals, it was well played anyway. Impact from the bench again as well, so it turned into a pretty good evening."

Liverpool now take a break from challenging for Premier League glory as they head to Fulham on Wednesday night for the second leg of their EFL Cup semi-final, aiming to protect a 2-1 lead from the opening encounter at Anfield.