Joe Gomez is now Liverpool’s longest-serving senior player, but the club’s tenured utility defender has found himself having to prove himself time and time again over the last 10 years.
Having arrived as an 18-year-old from Charlton in 2015, Gomez joined with a blossoming reputation and a £3.5 million price tag that suggested he would be immediately considered for the first team.
The brakes were never deliberately applied in the near-decade since, though as he learned again on Sunday, the bigger issue is when they are forcibly done so.
Gomez made his eighth consecutive start in the trip to West Ham that ended 2024 with a 5-0 win, but was unable to finish the first half as he pulled his hamstring in a challenge with Max Kilman and called for a substitution.
Jarell Quansah took his place and, speaking after the game, Arne Slot accepted that his No. 2 would be out for “quite a bit” as medical staff organised scans to take place at the start of the week.
The extent of Gomez’s injury is unclear, but its timing arguably could not have been worse for the player himself, who was visibly frustrated as he walked off the pitch with club doctor Amit Pannu.
When Ibrahima Konate‘s absence was confirmed following a ridiculous tackle from Real Madrid striker Endrick, Slot had the choice of two options as the Frenchman’s stand-in.
Given Conor Bradley and Kostas Tsimikas were also sidelined and Trent Alexander-Arnold had required painkilling injections to get through games, it was unclear at first whether the head coach would opt for Gomez or Quansah at centre-back.
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Gomez’s versatility suggested he could be kept for rotation at full-back, rather than alongside Virgil van Dijk in the centre, but Slot defied that logic and deployed him at the heart of defence.
It was a smart decision, particularly given Quansah’s inconsistency when called upon this season, with the reunion of Liverpool’s successful back four of years gone by providing the stability and assurance needed.
While it may have taken Gomez a period to find his feet again, before long he had rekindled the partnership with Van Dijk that made him such a key player under Jurgen Klopp, furnished by their understanding with Alexander-Arnold and Andy Robertson as full-backs.
Such was Gomez’s form in the absence of Konate – particularly against Man City, Tottenham and with 10 men against Fulham – that there could have been a debate over whether the No. 5 should immediately reclaim his starting spot when fit.
Gomez will certainly have felt that way, but now the decision is much simpler for Slot, who will now await the return of Konate as a matter of urgency.
It is a familiar scenario for Gomez, who has found himself in and out of favour during his time at Liverpool often due to his remarkable misfortune when it comes to injuries.
Van Dijk has been Liverpool’s only real constant at centre-back, with Gomez, Konate, Joel Matip and, for a time, Dejan Lovren cycled through as the Dutchman’s regular partners.
Though he may be burdened with the ‘injury prone’ label, it would be unfair to describe Gomez as such despite missing 226 games for club and country with cruciate ligament, heel and patellar tendon injuries as well as a broken leg.
Instead, he deserves to be recognised as a model professional and a dedicated athlete who has managed to overcome freak setbacks that would end the top-level careers of many others, with a mental fortitude to stay relevant at a club like Liverpool.
“I know how blessed I am to be here and it will be 10 years in the summer. I don’t take that for granted,” he said earlier in December, having seen a £45 million move to Newcastle break down over the summer.
“It is the best club in the world in my eyes and it was quickly a case of adapting and getting into the swing of things [after it was clear I would stay]. It was good to put it to bed.
“It’s football. To be somewhere 10 years and not have any blips would not be natural.”
On his role as a reliable squad player, however, he did add: “It is tricky because you don’t know when the chance will come or under what circumstances, what position and so on and so forth.
“But I can only control what I can focus on, and that is being the best professional I can be.”
It stands to reason that Gomez will resume that position when he returns from his hamstring injury, by which point Konate is likely to have reclaimed the spot alongside Van Dijk and, hopefully, found world-class form again.
Of course, Slot would likely have phased Konate back in regardless, but that Gomez has lost his spot through a muscle injury – almost certainly caused by an overload of minutes having been largely inactive beforehand – is a mental blow more than anything.
Still, as his head coach will acknowledge, Liverpool’s renaissance man has proved once again that he is more than just a valuable backup.
Joe Gomez can be relied upon whenever and wherever.
