Jürgen Klopp welcomed the selection headache he now faces at centre-back due to the return of Dejan Lovren and Joe Gomez.

Lovren made his first start in over three months in the 2-0 Champions League victory over FC Porto on Tuesday as he replaced Joel Matip, who had started all of Liverpool's previous 13 games.

Gomez, meanwhile, was part of the matchday squad in midweek for the first time in 2019, having recovered from a lower leg fracture sustained in December.

Including Virgil van Dijk, Klopp now has four senior central defenders to pick from ahead of Chelsea's visit to Anfield on Sunday, although the Reds boss stressed he will continue to take a cautious approach with Gomez.

Speaking at a press conference on Friday, he said: "We always have to make decisions. It's like it is.

"Having Joe around is a very difficult situation because what a wonderful footballer he is, but he needs time.

"He had not a lot of injury, but he had injuries in the last couple of years and we have to make sure he is 100 per cent fit.

"As long as the other boys are all fit and stuff like that, we can give Joe the time to train and maybe get some match practice in some other games - we will see how we can do that exactly, I'm not 100 per cent sure. But we will need Joe in the last part of the season."

The partnership of Lovren and Van Dijk against Porto saw Liverpool record their fourth-straight Champions League clean sheet at Anfield.

"Dejan did brilliant, he played a really good game after quite a while of being out for injury reasons," Klopp added.

"But it was so important that Joel and Virg could play through that period without Joe and Dejan - and Fabinho had to play as a centre-half as well.

"So we had a few problems and the boys always did really good with it. Now we don't have a problem in this moment with these kind of injuries, so we have a choice to make.

"That means everybody needs to show in training or in the games what gives us the biggest opportunity or possibility to win the next game - that's all what I think about."