Arne Slot revealed that Diogo Jota is . The striker emerged as a substitute against Nottingham Forest last week but sustained an issue during the last half an hour of the match and missed the trip to Brentford on Friday.

Jota will not feature against Lille in the on Tuesday, and Slot said he will be out for several weeks. "Maybe Jota is [set to return] a bit earlier than Joe [Gomez, who is out with a hamstring injury]. Both of them are expected back with us in weeks, not in months, but I've said many times before, that the last stage of rehab is the most difficult one, or the one that can sometimes add a few days or not. It's clear that we're expecting them back with us in the upcoming weeks. It is always difficult to say exactly how long it is, but both of them are not going to be back for months, as long as the rehab goes well."

Slot was asked whether the latest injury to Jota, who was also sidelined for the best part of two months towards the back end of last year, would prompt him to be even more cautious with Federico Chiesa, who continues to be slowly integrated into the first team after the Italian's own fitness problems in recent times.

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Slot said: "Every player is unique in his own way and everyone has his own background. Jota didn't have a long pre-season [because of the Euros] but he had a normal start where Federico didn't. Federico was unlucky in a few moments when he could have come in, where he was ill or sick.

"I think we also saw how difficult it is — Jota is a great example of that — for a player who has been out for several weeks, to bring him back to that load of playing every single game, 60 to 90 minutes, you have to be really careful with that if you don't want to go into another injury. Because there is no winter break, there is no time to give them a game during the week, unless I have to play them with the Under-21s but I don't think Chiesa or Jota should play in those games.

"Some players are such clear starters for us, I can just give them minutes. [Ibrahima] Konate had five weeks out and came straight in against Manchester United because he's such an important part of our team, whereas Chiesa has Mo Salah in front of him, so he doesn't have the same status in the team as Konate has, so that makes it hard for us to build him up in the right way.

"I'm happy he had a good 30 to 35 minutes versus Accrington Stanley, and he was part of the team that scored two goals, and he was really happy with it from what I saw."