Virgil van Dijk believes Liverpool have a high-quality back-up goalkeeper in Adrian who is more than capable of covering for Alisson while the Brazilian recovers from a calf injury.

The sight of Alisson being helped from the field on Friday night took some of the gloss off their opening day 4-1 victory over Norwich City. Boss Jürgen Klopp revealed afterwards that Alisson would be missing for the mid-week Uefa Super Cup clash against Chelsea and fears the injury could be serious.

While Liverpool wait to learn the extent of the problem for their No.1, van Dijk has given his backing to Adrian, who stepped off the bench to make his debut against Norwich.

The 32-year-old made just five appearances for West Ham last season before making the move to Merseyside in the summer. While van Dijk admits that losing Alisson is far from ideal, he feels Adrian is a more than adequate replacement.

“I think he’s at that kind of age, that stage of his life and career that he can come in and slot in to the team pretty easy,” said the Reds defender.

“He’s been through so many things in the Premier League he can just slot in pretty easy.” When asked about Alisson’s injury, the former Southampton defender added: “He’s very important for us, but I’ve no idea what the actual damage is.

“We have to deal with it and we’re going to deal with it.” The Reds will head off to Turkey this week to prepare for their Uefa Super Cup clash in Istanbul and are 1.75 to get the better of Chelsea.

The Europa League winners are 4.75 to pick up their first piece of silverware under Frank Lampard while the draw is 3.80.