Diogo Jota is expected to make his return from injury shortly after the November international break.
The Liverpool forward picked up the injury during the 2-1 victory over Chelsea at Anfield last month and has since missed the Reds’ last five matches.
Jota will once again be absent when Liverpool host Aston Villa on Saturday night.
However, during his pre-match press conference, Arne Slot confirmed that Diogo Jota is on track for a return in the coming weeks.
The head coach said on Friday morning: “We expect him back after the international break… the first weeks after the international break we expect him back.”
On the nature of Jota’s injury, Slot added: “I always say in Holland there is privacy about this and I don’t know how it is over here. Like I just said, he will be back one or two weeks after the international break.”
Jota’s absence has allowed Darwin Nunez to step up as Liverpool’s first-choice No. 9, but Slot has also explored a variety of alternatives in attack.
Most recently, Slot experimented with Luis Díaz, who scored a hat-trick in Liverpool’s 4-0 demolition of Bayer Leverkusen midweek, starting the match as a centre-forward.
When asked about his approach to the forward position and whether he would continue to rotate his options, Slot kept his response open-ended.
“When we had Darwin and Diogo available, we always played one of those two,” he explained.
“The moment Diogo was no longer available – and, in my opinion, because we play so many games and Darwin didn’t play in the first games, it was too much for him – that’s why we started to come up with other ideas.
“To be honest I liked especially the last idea, I think every Liverpool supporter did, with Lucho scoring three goals – two as a nine, one as a winger.
“So that’s always interesting to see, but Lucho is also a very good left winger.
“At this moment we’ve got four attackers available for three positions, so we could come up with another again, but if Diogo is back, Darwin is back, then we’ve got two No. 9s available again.
“In the beginning of the season I always chose one of these two.
“But like I said, Lucho did really well and it was even for me maybe a bit of surprise to see how well he did.
“Of course, I played him there for a reason, I expected him to do good, but that he did so well, that was even a surprise for me.”
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