Liverpool: Jurgen Klopp sweating over the fitness of players who are away on international duty

Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp is sweating over the fitness of his players on international duty with their respective countries and is hoping that everyone comes back without any injuries. The Reds face a crucial Premier League clash against title contenders Tottenham Hotspur on 2 April – three days after the international break.

No fewer than 19 players have been called up by their respective national teams with most of them playing friendlies ahead the European Championship finals in France later this year. However, Philippe Coutinho, who is a key player for the manager has been called up by Brazil for their World Cup qualifiers against Uruguay and Paraguay.

The former Borussia Dortmund boss has wished his players the best for their matches, as he believes the clashes are more of tests than friendlies and also their last chance to impress the manager ahead of squad selection for Euro 2016. The remaining Liverpool squad along with Klopp have traveled to Tenerife in Spain for a weeklong warm weather training break and will return to the club's Melwood training base on Sunday.

The manager is aware that the rest of the squad will arrive only on Wednesday, three days prior to the visit of the north London club. But he is not concerned about the lack of preparation time, only about the fitness of his players and he is hoping that the national team bosses go relatively easy on his players and not over exert them.

"I wish them all success in the international fixtures and I hope they all come back healthy," Klopp said, as quoted by the Liverpool Echo.

"It's a difficult time when you have so many players away but I respect that it's a really important moment with the European Championships coming up. These are the last few games in the preparations for the Euros. It's a chance for the players to secure their places."

"Of course there aren't any real friendly games, these are test games and we just hope they play well and come back to us healthy ready to help us for the rest of the season," he explained.

"We start training again at Melwood on Monday. Most of those who are away for the internationals have games on Tuesday so we won't have them back until Wednesday. That's the same for Tottenham. It's not the biggest difference. We usually have three days to prepare for a game and that will be the same next week."

"It's important for us that the players remain healthy and that not too many have had to play in two (international) games," the German manager added.