Klopp Says He Won’t Force Diaz’s Availability

Liverpool manager Jürgen Klopp has decided to give Lius Diaz the room to decide his availability to the club as his father remains in the custody of a militant group in Columbia.

According to Klopp, the player’s availability falls out of his discretion.

“I cannot really say what we will do because we just wait where we can pick up the boy from and go from there. But it’s all about him, that he makes himself available or not, and I will not force anything.”

He confirmed the player had been to their training sessions in the last two days and recognised he had been having sleepless nights.

“He was in training two days ago, he had yesterday a session and will be part of the team. We must wait – if he feels right he will be here and train with us.

“The session he had with us, because then we were not here, you could see that when he is with the boys it is fine, it’s OK. But you could see as well that he didn’t sleep a lot,” he said in a pre-match presser.

The father of Diaz, Luis Manuel, was kidnapped by the National Liberation Army (ELN) on Saturday together with his wife at gunpoint at a petrol station in Barrancas in Colombia, however, her mother was rescued the same day by the police.

The captors released a statement on Thursday, saying their captive will be released as soon as possible.

Diaz was withdrawn from Liverpool’s squad against Nottingham Forest last Sunday due to the development.

The Reds will face Luton Town on Saturday.