Leeds United unsuccessful in appeal against Pascal Struijk red card
The midfielder was sent off after Liverpool midfielder Harvey Elliot was injured at Elland Road
Last updated 15th Sep 2021
Leeds' appeal against the red card shown to Pascal Struijk in Sunday's 3-0 loss to Liverpool has been unsuccessful, the club have announced.
Struijk was shown a straight red card in the second half of the Premier League match at Elland Road for a challenge on Liverpool's Harvey Elliott.
With the appeal having being unsuccessful, Strujik will now be suspended for Leeds' game at Newcastle on Friday, the Carabao Cup tie at Fulham four days later and the home clash with West Ham the following Saturday.
Elliott is expected to play again this season after undergoing successful surgery on a fracture dislocation of his left ankle.
He underwent an operation on Tuesday and will subsequently begin a programme of rehabilitation.
"Harvey sustained a fracture dislocation of his left ankle during the game," club doctor Dr Jim Moxon told liverpoolfc.com.
"We were able to reduce the dislocation immediately on the pitch and Harvey had surgery today to repair the fracture and ligaments damaged in the incident.
"The operation was a success so his comeback starts now
"We won't put pressure on him by setting a specific timeframe beyond being able to say with confidence we expect him to feature again later in the season following our rehab programme."
The news will come as a positive to manager Jurgen Klopp, who had been awaiting news of the surgery and said Elliott "was in the best possible place. He took it (and) accepted already that he would be out for a while".
Goalkeeper Alisson Becker said:
"The medical staff obviously had to work hard to give him the best conditions for recovery but Harvey knows that we are here for him whenever he needs us.
"We are a real unit as a team. We celebrate together, and when an important player gets injured we are injured together for him."