{"id":68001,"date":"2025-09-16T17:42:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-16T17:42:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/68001\/"},"modified":"2025-09-16T17:42:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-16T17:42:07","slug":"arne-slot-hints-at-alexander-isak-start-vs-atletico-madrid-liverpool-fc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/68001\/","title":{"rendered":"Arne Slot hints at Alexander Isak start vs. Atletico Madrid – Liverpool FC"},"content":{"rendered":"

Arne Slot<\/a> has not ruled Alexander Isak<\/a> out from starting against Atletico Madrid on Wednesday night, with the new Liverpool striker primed for his debut.<\/b><\/p>\n

Isak will be in the squad for Liverpool\u2019s Champions League<\/a> opener and could even be in contention to replace Hugo Ekitike<\/a> up front.<\/p>\n

After sitting out the 1-0 win over Burnley<\/a> at the weekend, instead focusing on training, the new No. 9 is ready for at least 45 minutes.<\/p>\n

Speaking in his pre-match press conference on Tuesday, Slot confirmed that Isak will be involved against Atletico and hinted that he could start.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s definitely a chance, because he\u2019s in the squad,\u201d he said when asked the chances of Isak featuring.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen there\u2019s a chance to play.<\/p>\n

\u201cNormally I would say 99.9 percent sure, but I can say it\u2019s 100 percent sure that he will not play 90 minutes, but he\u2019s part of the squad.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s already a Champions League<\/a> game to look forward to, but if people look forward to his playing time, that could happen tomorrow as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked if Isak could start, Slot replied: \u201cThe only thing that is sure is that he will not play 90. All the rest, you will see tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"LIVERPOOL,<\/p>\n

Clearly, having not started a game since the end of last season and not trained as part of a team over the summer, there is a long road ahead for Isak in terms of full fitness.<\/p>\n

Slot considers his \u00a3125 million signing as being in the midst of a pre-season of sorts, with his game time being carefully managed in line with his teammates and their summer friendlies.<\/p>\n

Questioned on Isak\u2019s biggest challenge to come, the head coach replied: \u201cGetting fit after missing four months of proper team sessions.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe doesn\u2019t have to prove to anyone that he\u2019s good enough to play in the Premier League<\/a>, because that\u2019s what he\u2019s proven already at Newcastle<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe main challenge he has is to become so fit that he\u2019s first of all ready to do what he did last season.<\/p>\n

\"LIVERPOOL,<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd then speaking about Paris Saint-Germain [last season], I don\u2019t think anyone was surprised that I was mainly impressed by the way they press.<\/p>\n

\u201cOusmane Dembele was one of the examples, he was so outstanding in his pressing game.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo everybody is focused on Paris Saint-Germain, about all the goals they score, but I was mainly impressed by the way they pressed.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe moment he\u2019s fit, match fit, and can play 90, the next step is playing three times in a week 90 minutes, and then the next step is going one step further in terms of pressing.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s what he has to do, and scoring goals, doing special things in attack, that is something he will 100 percent sure do.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Arne Slot has not ruled Alexander Isak out from starting against Atletico Madrid on Wednesday night, with the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":68002,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[9,10,18,13,14,6,19,17,11,12,560,15,16,5,7,8],"class_list":{"0":"post-68001","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-eire","11":"tag-featured-news","12":"tag-featurednews","13":"tag-headlines","14":"tag-ie","15":"tag-ireland","16":"tag-latest-news","17":"tag-latestnews","18":"tag-liverpool-fc","19":"tag-main-news","20":"tag-mainnews","21":"tag-news","22":"tag-top-stories","23":"tag-topstories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68001","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68001"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68001\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68002"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68001"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68001"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68001"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}