Ibrahima Konate injury: Physio explains potential time out – Van Dijk hopeful

With Arne Slot not giving much away on Ibrahima Konate‘s injury sustained against Brighton, a football physio has hypothesised about how long he could be out.

Konate’s game against Brighton ended early as he was forced to withdraw at half time, walking off the pitch while using his shirt as a makeshift sling.

From the replays, it seems he fell awkwardly on his left wrist and he was later seen leaving Anfield with said wrist heavily strapped.

A football physio, going by the name of @physioscout on X, explained a couple of potential scenarios that Liverpool could be facing with regard to the Frenchman’s injury.

Ibrahima Konate had to come off at halftime after suffering an arm injury. In this case, it is likely that the wrist area is affected.

Virgil Vijk was seen stepping on Konate’s wrist. This brings concern for a wrist/forearm fracture as the worse case scenario. If he’s lucky it… pic.twitter.com/8i3FBG7LxJ

— Physio Scout | Football Injury Analysis (@physioscout) November 2, 2024

The physio wrote: “Virgil Vijk was seen stepping on Konate’s wrist. This brings concern for a wrist/forearm fracture as the worst-case scenario. If he’s lucky it could only be a bony contusion/bruise.

“If it’s confirmed to be a wrist fracture, he would likely need surgery on it. Possible that he avoids surgery if the wrist area is stable.”

They then went on to hypothesise how long Konate could be out for, with a bony contusion only causing him to miss less than a week.

However, a wrist fracture could leave him sidelined for a minimum of four weeks, with another two likely if surgery is required.

The physio went on to add: “Was previously worried that he injured it when falling onto an outstretched arm, or him slapping away the defender. However, it’s likely that it happened here when VVD stepped on him.”

‘So many bodies around the ball and I think I hit him on his arm’

Virgil van Dijk explains what lead to Konaté’s arm injury ? pic.twitter.com/MamRJmlcv0

— Sky Sports Premier League (@SkySportsPL) November 2, 2024

Van Dijk’s version of events seems to match up with that, the captain telling Sky Sports: “There were so many bodies around the ball and I think I hit him on the arm.

“Hopefully it is not too bad, we’ll just have to wait and see. You can be quite ok as a player with an arm injury so hopefully he will be fine.”

Arne Slot’s comments on Ibrahima Konate injury

After the match, Slot was still in the dark on Konate’s injury but did offer some insight into the defender’s issue.

“He had a lot of pain at half-time,” he said.

“So it was not only the first half that was a big disappointment, also the disappointment that he had to go out, because he’s been really good for us the whole season.”

Asked again about the injury, Slot said: “We don’t know yet, he had a lot of pain but he hasn’t been to the hospital yet and maybe it’s not even necessary to go to the hospital, I don’t know.

“It’s always difficult to judge an injury in the first hour or first 10 minutes after it happened.

“Let’s hope that he can be with us as soon as possible, because he had a big impact on our season until now.”