Salah, Van Dijk, Jones Released Early From International Duty

Photo by Sayed Hassan/Getty Images

And it’s not injury-related!

Liverpool have come into an international break windfall with two of their best and most influential players returning early. Mohamed Salah scored in Egypt’s 2-0 victory in their African Cup of Nations qualifier against Mauritania. That was on Friday. Their next match is on Tuesday against the same opponents, but his services will not be required. He’s been allowed to return home, though it’s yet unknown if he went straight back to England or visited home first.

Meanwhile, in Europe, our fearless captain, Virgil van Dijk basically got himself sent back through picking up two quick yellow cards in the second half. Netherlands were facing Hungary in the very real and important UEFA Nations League competition. The clock was ticking up and the Dutch trailed 1-0. Van Dijk got his first yellow in the 76th minute and wasted no time grabbing number two only three minutes later. The two yellow cards mean that he’s ineligible to play the next match. Despite going down to 10 men, the team still managed to rally and end the match in a 1-1 draw.

In more exciting news, Curtis Jones, who had been an unused substitute for England’s UEFA Nations League (I can’t be the only one who always wants to say United Nations) match against Greece. He was then released back to Merseyside for an “undisclosed personal reason.” His girlfriend is currently very, very pregnant, so there will likely be a new baby doing the lap of honor at Anfield at the end of the season. It’s unknown if Jones will miss any of Liverpool’s games as he (taps wood) jumps into fatherhood.