{"id":255424,"date":"2026-01-21T03:12:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-21T03:12:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/255424\/"},"modified":"2026-01-21T03:12:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-21T03:12:09","slug":"slot-drops-salah-selection-hint-as-forward-returns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/255424\/","title":{"rendered":"Slot drops Salah selection hint as forward returns"},"content":{"rendered":"

Liverpool head coach Arne Slot dropped a huge hint that Mohamed Salah would start in the Champions League against Marseille in his first match since returning from the Africa Cup of Nations.<\/p>\n

Salah was included in the travelling squad which flew to the south of France after finishing fourth with Egypt on Saturday.<\/p>\n

That was at least better than their previous European game against Inter Milan<\/a> when the 33-year-old was left at home following his explosive comments after the 3-3 draw with Leeds<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He accused the club of throwing him “under the bus” after results took a dive, suggested he had no relationship with Slot and questioned his future.<\/p>\n

Salah returned as a first-half substitute against Brighton but left for Morocco with his position still under a cloud.<\/p>\n

Marseille is the first chance to gauge whether there has been much progress on that front.<\/p>\n

Asked about his current relationship with Salah, Slot said: “As normal as it’s always been, with one exception and that was Inter.<\/p>\n

“Let\u2019s see for the line-up tomorrow if you still think there\u2019s an issue. I spoke to him today and I\u2019m happy to have him back.<\/p>\n

“There\u2019s been a moment in the season where I decided not to play Mo and one moment where I decided not to take him to the game.<\/p>\n

\"Mo
\nSalah celebrates a goal against Benin at the Africa Cup of Nations<\/p>\n

“For all the other games he\u2019s been in the squad and was the first substitution against Brighton so at that moment of time, there\u2019s never been an issue for me.”<\/p>\n

Salah\u2019s absence may have been beneficial to him as the team\u2019s 12-match unbeaten run has been far from convincing, with four of their six draws coming in the last five matches.<\/p>\n

With Liverpool struggling to finish off opponents the Egyptian, whose last club goal came on 1 November, has an opportunity to make an impact after scoring four in six AFCON games.<\/p>\n

“He went to AFCON and did what he usually does and scored goals,” added Slot.<\/p>\n

“In his absence I think we have done quite OK in terms of hardly conceding any chances and starting to create more and more\u2026then it is really helpful to have Mohamed Salah.<\/p>\n

\"MARSEILLE,<\/p>\n

“There has only been one (player still alive) who scored more for this club but I don\u2019t think I can play Ian Rush still.”<\/p>\n

Slot (above) was asked whether he felt under more pressure now Xabi Alonso had been sacked by Real Madrid<\/a> and whether the former Liverpool midfielder had spoken to him.<\/p>\n

“Yes he called me and said ‘What do you think about the team because I am going to take over in six months, can you tell me a little bit more?\u2019 Or maybe earlier, maybe he takes over tomorrow,” the Dutchman joked.<\/p>\n

“That is the weirdest question I ever got.”<\/p>\n

Slot will speak to centre-back Ibrahima Konate, who is in France but did not travel with the squad for personal issues, to see whether he could be available.<\/p>\n

Watch Marseille v Liverpool in the Champions League on Wednesday from 7pm on RT\u00c92 and RT\u00c9 Player. Follow a live blog on the RT\u00c9 News App and on rte.ie\/sport<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Liverpool head coach Arne Slot dropped a huge hint that Mohamed Salah would start in the Champions League…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":255425,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[61,60,112],"class_list":{"0":"post-255424","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-ie","9":"tag-ireland","10":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255424","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=255424"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255424\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/255425"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=255424"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=255424"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=255424"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}