After making his way into the Liverpool first team, Kaide Gordon had a rough time due to injuries, but he was back in Jurgen Klopp’s squad for the loss in Toulouse.
Kaide Gordon, the wonderkid for Liverpool, made his much anticipated comeback against Toulouse and revealed he was happy to be back among the first team players.
Gordon, 19, paid £1 million to join the Reds from Derby in February 2021. He made his debut in the first team seven months later, against Norwich, in a Carabao Cup match. In January 2022, the forward scored his first goal for Liverpool against Shrewsbury, making him the club’s second youngest scorer.
Gordon made his Premier League debut against Brentford the following weekend. But a few weeks later, Gordon experienced a pelvic issue related to his physical growth, which prevented him from playing for over a year and a half. Gordon resumed full training in July 2023, but suffered another setback when he injured his ankle while substituting for Liverpool Under 21s against Middlesbrough in the second half.
Due to that, Gordon was sidelined for a month until making a comeback, this time for the U21s against Leeds. In the Bristol Street Motors Trophy, he earned his first competitive start against Barrow. A day later, Klopp selected him for the senior team’s journey to Toulouse.
Gordon was happy to be back in the first-team training despite not being utilized as a substitute in the 3-2 loss at Stadium TFC – nearly two years after his last game. “Not the result we wanted but good to be back around it after so long,” he posted on Instagram following the game.
Barry Lewtas, the manager of Liverpool U21s, discussed Gordon’s issue and how injuries affect young players’ advancement through the ranks during his summer speech. “What is difficult with certain kinds of injuries, especially with younger boys who are growing, they are complicated,” he told the Liverpool Echo.
“It’s not like breaking a bone, which mends and allows you to continue. Unfortunately for Kaide, some of these ailments are more complicated than others. Kaide’s growth has been connected to it; he’s grown larger and taller since his last game.
We always knew not to establish a deadline because we understood it might take a while, we didn’t want to raise his expectations too high, and we also wanted to keep him in the proper frame of mind. Given that he is a player who has already had an influence on the first team, it is done without increasing expectations for anyone else. We’ll see how he does; he has been pacing the pitch a little more.
