Lucas’ influence in a holding midfield role has been sorely missed since he ruptured his cruciate knee ligament in a Carling Cup tie at Chelsea in December.
The Reds had just enjoyed back-to-back away wins in the Premier League at West Brom and Chelsea and drawn 1-1 with then runaway league leaders Manchester City when Lucas suffered his season ending injury.
Since then he has been forced to endure a watching brief, including Saturday’s disappointing Anfield reverse.
He used the Twitter network yesterday to tweet: “I know everyone is disappointed about yesterday, but we need to move on and keep working.”
He added: “My rehab is going well and hopefully I will be fit for next season. It was a bad injury so I need to recover properly to be strong again.”
Lucas had missed just one Premier League match, through suspension, before his unfortunate injury.
Since then Charlie Adam, Jay Spearing, Jordan Henderson and Steven Gerrard have all been used in central midfield roles as the Reds have struggled to find any level of consistency in results and performances.