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Mohamed Salah’s relationship with Liverpool is broken. That is abundantly clear after the incendiary interview at Elland Road on Saturday night that also poses a test of the club’s relationship with Arne Slot. The next revelation will be the extent of internal support for the coach who delivered Liverpool’s record-equalling 20th league title eight months ago.
Salah may have been emotional having been benched for the third successive game, but stunning waiting reporters not only by stopping to speak but by dropping a series of grenades during a post-match interview lasting more than seven minutes was not a case of heart ruling head. It never is when one of the greatest players to pull on the red shirt deigns to address the media. Whether it is criticism of contract negotiations, applying a little more pressure to get an agreeable deal done or, in this instance, piling more problems on Slot, Salah’s words are calculated to achieve what he wants.
At Leeds, however, he may well have overplayed his hand. This has echoes of Roy Keane’s infamous MUTV interview that led to Manchester United sacking their captain 20 years ago. And Keane’s words were not made public at the time. The full transcript has still never appeared.
The Egypt international twice accused Liverpool of throwing him under a bus in response to their dismal Premier League title defence. Salah made sure that everyone else at Liverpool – the club’s hierarchy, head coach and even teammates he professed to love – would be under it with him.
Slot went under the bus with Salah’s revelation that there is no longer a relationship between Liverpool’s head coach and star player. An untenable situation. Members of the club’s hierarchy – specifically the sporting director Richard Hughes and Michael Edwards, chief executive of football at Fenway Sports Group (FSG) – were dragged under by Salah’s claim that someone wants him out of the club. Unwittingly or otherwise, the finger immediately points in their direction with Liverpool committed to paying the 33-year-old more than £32m for the remaining 19 months of a contract signed only in April.
Teammates were thrown under too by Salah’s entitled insistence that he has earned the position Slot has taken from him. Only in the past week, mind you. Those teammates include Dominik Szoboszlai, Liverpool’s best performer this season, who started in Salah’s place against West Ham, Sunderland and Leeds. Virgil van Dijk might take issue with his colleague too, having said: “It’s not like you have unlimited credit, everyone has to perform,” when asked about Salah’s demotion in midweek.
Another post-Sunderland line from the Liverpool captain leaps out after Salah’s interview. “I need him around as one of the leaders,” Van Dijk said on Wednesday. This was not leadership from Salah, it was pure self-indulgence and a betrayal of the dressing room. There is seemingly no end to Liverpool’s problems this season, too many of them self-inflicted.
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The club wanted to let the dust settle on Sunday and consider their response with cool heads. The response must be emphatic, however, or Slot’s position will be seriously undermined by his own employers. And his position has already weakened in the eyes of many supporters after a miserable run of results and performances. Keane was sacked by United after directly lambasting his teammates. Salah did not go that far but he has taken on his manager and openly criticised his decision-making. Liverpool cannot allow that to pass if Slot is to retain authority over the rest of the squad. Banishing the striker from this week’s Champions League trip to Milan to play Inter and the home game against Brighton on Saturday, when Salah floated the possibility of saying goodbye to Anfield – permanently, or just before heading off to the Africa Cup of Nations, went unsaid – seems a fair place to start.
It is usually easier, and cheaper, to change an underperforming manager than an underachieving team. But given Salah’s age and marked decline in form this season, that is less of a dilemma for Liverpool. It appears inconceivable that Salah and Slot will both be Liverpool employees by the time the former’s contract expires in the summer of 2027.
The club’s next move will reveal who they are backing. Hughes, Edwards and FSG will be acutely aware of Saudi Arabian interest in Salah and the probability of it ramping up in January. Liverpool were right to reject a £150m bid from Al-Ittihad for the forward in September 2023. His phenomenal contribution to last season’s title triumph alone justifies that decision. But there must be a greater temptation to cash in now, especially if the proceeds enable Liverpool to strengthen when the transfer window reopens next month. Bournemouth’s Antoine Semenyo, signed for the south coast club by Hughes, is understood to have a £65m release clause that can be activated in the first two weeks of January.
Salah’s interview was divisive – it may have been given with a move to Saudi in mind – but it has received some support because it chimes with the frustrations surrounding Liverpool’s season. The striker is correct to say he should not be singled-out for their failings when so many players are struggling. The club spent almost £450m on a team that won the Premier League comfortably last season and have gone backwards. Fast.
Hugo Ekitiké is the only one of Liverpool’s expensive summer signings to have had a noticeable impact. Slot has spoken of his team’s problems with set pieces, low blocks, costly defensive errors and profligacy all season and hasn’t rectified any of them. Ao Tanaka’s 96th-minute equaliser for Leeds on Saturday was the 10th goal Liverpool have conceded from a set piece in the Premier League this season.
Salah will retain hero status at Liverpool irrespective of the fallout from his interview, although an internal show of support for Slot would confirm the club believe he has gone too far. “Somehow it will end,” he said in Leeds. “But the thing in my head is why it should end this way?” Because sadly you chose to end it this way, would be one reason.
