Mohamed Salah loves to hear stories about Steven Gerrard and Sir Kenny Dalglish from Liverpool fans who work at the training ground. He can recite his predecessors\u2019 numbers and achievements, having spent the past nine years in pursuit of both, but what really captivates him are tales of how they became legends in the eyes of the Kop. Salah has always longed to be in that company. While that makes his recent public criticisms all the more unfortunate, it does not diminish his phenomenal achievement in reaching that goal.<\/p>\n
There is acrimony at the end<\/a> of Salah\u2019s Liverpool career, as there was a degree of antipathy at the start. He will be celebrated for the relentless brilliance in between.<\/p>\n A Chelsea failure who had rebuilt his career \u201conly\u201d in Serie A, it is amusing to recall the lukewarm reception to the announcement on Friday 23 June 2017 that Liverpool had completed the club-record signing of Salah for \u00a336.9m<\/a> from Roma. J\u00fcrgen Klopp\u2019s welcome message, however, contained a few clues into the character that would forge one of the greatest of all Liverpool careers.<\/p>\n \u201cHis pace is incredible, he gives us more attacking threat and we are already strong in this area,\u201d said the Liverpool<\/a> manager. So far, so standard for a new arrival. But Klopp, who had trusted the data analysts who pushed Salah\u2019s claims over his German contacts who vouched for Bayer Leverkusen\u2019s Julian Brandt, continued: \u201cMost important, though, for us, is that he is hungry, willing and eager to be even better and improve further. He is an ambitious player who wants to win and win at the highest level; he knows he can fulfil those ambitions with Liverpool.\u201d<\/p>\n As Salah prepares to take his leave from Liverpool after 257 goals, 441 appearances, eight major honours and numerous rewrites of the record books, he does so secure in the knowledge he could not have given any more to realise Klopp\u2019s mission statement. He will depart with legendary status assured at Anfield and as a global star. And still, one month shy of his 34th birthday, possessing the hunger and ambition that set him apart from the outset. Which, of course, is one of the main reasons Salah is leaving Liverpool 12 months before his contract is due to expire and on a sour note.<\/p>\n The greats rarely exit smoothly or with gratitude for the manager with the unenviable task of telling them their time is up. But at least Gerrard and Dalglish kept their counsel while they remained Liverpool employees. Salah is adamant he has more to give at the highest level and that he was unfairly scapegoated for Liverpool\u2019s dismal season when dropped for three games by Arne Slot late last year. Being benched for both legs of the Champions League quarter-final defeat by Paris Saint-Germain<\/a> will be considered a further insult.<\/p>\n Mohamed Salah was an instant hit at Anfield, scoring 44 goals in his first season, 2017-18. Photograph: Peter Byrne\/PA<\/p>\n The third-highest goalscorer in Liverpool\u2019s illustrious history has made his feelings clear with three public attempts to undermine Slot in the past six months, the latest over his style of play and the team \u201ccrumbling\u201d<\/a> to another defeat, at Aston Villa. It is an unnecessary ending but does not alter the belief that Salah, Slot and Liverpool have arrived at the right conclusion. The forward\u2019s pace is on the wane and he is not programmed to accept a diminished role. The head coach needs more energy in the final third and work off the ball. The club will not have to pay the remainder of a contract that could have cost them up to \u00a326m. It is the right call to go their separate ways.<\/p>\n Parting shots should have waited. Salah\u2019s emotional farewell to Anfield on Sunday should be a moment to salute a fierce competitor who pushed himself into Liverpool\u2019s hall of fame, an essential part of one of the club\u2019s finest teams and forward lines, and the almost unstoppable force who propelled Slot\u2019s side to a record\u2011equalling 20th league title 13 months ago.<\/p>\n His impact was instant and remarkably consistent, and would help change his and Liverpool\u2019s fortunes. Salah scored on his Premier League debut for Liverpool, as he would on the opening day of eight of his nine seasons with the club. By the end of his first campaign the Egypt international had 44 goals, the first of four Premier League Golden Boots and the first in a hat-trick of clean sweeps of the Professional Footballers\u2019 Association and Football Writers\u2019 Association player of the year awards. It is testament to Salah\u2019s longevity that those accolades were spread over a seven-year period. As are goals\u2011per\u2011season numbers of 44, 27, 23, 31, 31, 30, 25 and 34, before this campaign\u2019s steep decline to 12 with one game, at home to Brentford, to come on Sunday.<\/p>\n Liverpool fans pay tribute to Mohamed Salah ahead of February\u2019s match against Manchester City at Anfield. Photograph: Adam Vaughan\/EPA<\/p>\n Liverpool\u2019s hopes have been regularly pinned to Salah for nine years. For the moments when the Premier League title felt destined for Anfield \u2013 the 90th-minute clincher against Manchester United<\/a> in January 2020 and completing the comeback against Brighton in November 2024 \u2013 it was the team\u2019s No 11 who led the way. The massed groan from Liverpool fans when he left the 2018 Champions League final in tears as a result of Sergio Ramos\u2019s MMA manoeuvre was the flipside of the expectation he carried. A year later Salah sent Liverpool on their way to a sixth European Cup\/Champions League triumph<\/a> in Madrid. He has shaped much of the club\u2019s recent history.<\/p>\n That Kyiv 2018 final was an early demonstration of how, unlike many players under a global spotlight, Salah\u2019s brushes with controversy are entwined with the game itself. He is devoted to his family, his religion and his sport, and has little time for anything else. Yes, he played Liverpool during contract negotiations and used rare appearances in front of the media to strengthen his hand. It is only this season that he was unable to give full value for good money.<\/p>\n There were fallings-out with Klopp as well as Slot when he was omitted from the starting lineup or substituted without an injury; the angry reactions of a player dedicated to winning for Liverpool and unable to accept anything less. His outburst at Leeds<\/a> in December can be viewed in that context, if we are being generous. First and last in the gym, with extra shooting practice in between, swimming at midnight and almost always available throughout an intense career at the highest level, Salah has maintained and pushed standards.<\/p>\n Salah puts Liverpool ahead in the 2019 Champions League final as they atoned for their defeat in the showpiece a year earlier. Photograph: Toby Melville\/Reuters<\/p>\n Despite the seriousness of his approach to the game, Salah can be lighthearted around the training ground and good fun with a self-deprecating sense of humour. He was profoundly affected by Diogo Jota\u2019s death last July and the grief he displayed in front of the Kop after the first home game of the season against Bournemouth the following month did not surprise anyone at the club.<\/p>\n His humanitarian instincts also prompted the video message<\/a> he released in 2023 that called for an end to the massacres in Gaza and for aid to be allowed in. As one of the highest-profile Muslim sportsmen on the planet, Salah knows the power of his voice. When Uefa paid tribute to Suleiman al-Obeid last year but failed to mention the \u201cPalestinian Pel\u00e9\u201d had been killed in an Israeli attack while waiting for humanitarian aid, Salah responded with: \u201cCan you tell us how he died<\/a>, where, and why?\u201d His decision to carefully call out European football\u2019s governing body received widespread support.<\/p>\n Salah has a reach and status that few in the game can equal. One social media post demanding the return of heavy-metal football is enough to generate headlines worldwide and dominate the final week of an exhausting season for Liverpool. But, as Gerrard and Dalglish can testify, time waits for no one. There will be consolation for Salah once the resentment over his final season has subsided and cooler heads have returned. One day a player will sit down at Liverpool\u2019s training ground and ask what he has to do to join the club\u2019s all-time greats, and he will listen to tales about \u201cthe Egyptian King\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mohamed Salah loves to hear stories about Steven Gerrard and Sir Kenny Dalglish from Liverpool fans who work…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":598357,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":["post-598356","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/598356","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=598356"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/598356\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/598357"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=598356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=598356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=598356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}