Mo Salah

[SB]

And Real Madrid will refuse to attend again

[DerKrampus]

Salah has to win the Ballond'or this year - if he wins the CL too then it's a dead cert.

[red g]

And Real Madrid will refuse to attend again

They won;t because MBappe will win win it.

[SB]

They won;t because MBappe will win win it.

Oh ok , then Vini will have his nose out of joint & put in a transfer request

[Cerbie]

Oh ok , then Vini will have his nose out of joint & put in a transfer request to join Liverpool

fixed it for you!

[Buzzo]

More stats.

It's not just the goals and assists that set Mohamed Salah apart from the rest of the competition.
Here are a few more numbers to prove that the Liverpool talisman is having a Premier League season to remember.

Total shots:
Mohamed Salah - 98
Erling Haaland - 94
Antoine Semenyo - 93

Shots on target:
Erling Haaland - 54
Mohamed Salah - 52
Cole Palmer - 38

Chances created from open play:
Mohamed Salah - 58
Dejan Kulusevski - 56
Cole Palmer - 54

Touches inside opposition box:
Mohamed Salah - 286
Erling Haaland - 169
Dejan Kulusevski - 164

Big chances created:
Cole Palmer - 19
Mohamed Salah - 19
Bukayo Saka - 19

[SB]

it crossed my mind but there’s no room for big egos like that

fixed it for you!

[Buzzo]

Genius-level Salah enters his imperial phase to guide Liverpool to win at City

Barney Ronay at the Etihad Stadium

Arguably the best attacking player in the world this season did three startlingly high-grade things to ensure victory

If you’re going to win it in February, win it in February right. On a rain-sodden day in Manchester, the kind of afternoon when the wind chases you around, lifting up the hem of your coat and firing a draught of ice-cold water up your spine, Liverpool didn’t so much overwhelm Manchester City as stroll politely past, all controlled aggression and strength in reserve.

A 2-0 scoreline seemed fair enough by the end. But then, by half-time this already felt like a victory lap. Albeit, an apposite one. If this really is to be the moment Liverpool took a decisive lead down the back straight, it happened in a way that reflects perfectly the calm, still centre of their season, both goals arriving in a 23-minute spell when Mohamed Salah decided it was time to bend the day to his will.

From August to the fag end of winter, Salah has played with a kind of light around him this season. Perhaps in time this will come to be seen as his imperial phase, a perfectly ripe footballer in a team perfectly set up to feed his cutting edge. In the first half he did three startlingly high‑grade things.

The first was scoring Liverpool’s opening goal. A low corner form the right was pea-rolled into the centre and funnelled on by a fine touch from Dominik Szoboszlai to Salah unmarked by the penalty spot. The first-time shot was hard, low and deflected past Ederson.

The second moment of High Salah was both breathtaking and the genesis of Liverpool’s second goal. Again he took the ball in the left channel as City’s players just seemed to melt away, drowning in aura, not wanting to look directly at this thing. From there Salah produced the most delightful stunned reverse no-look nudge into the run of Trent Alexander-Arnold, one of those moments where you get a sense of a footballer operating with his footballing third eye wide open, just rearranging the other parts around him.

It came to nothing, but moments later Salah set up the second goal. Again he was given a kind of presidential motorcade escort down the City left, before passing inside for Szoboszlai to roll a shot into the corner. As the ball hit the net Salah was already clenching his fists like a man about to set fire to his air guitar, the look of a footballer who knows this game is done.

You can sometimes get a little too used to extraordinary things happening. The goal and the assist here made it 25 and 16 in the league, and nine in his last eight games in all competitions as the season narrows to a point.

Just as striking, all of this has been enacted with that weirdly carefree air of ruthlessness, the certainty of the player who takes penalties like he’s trying to destroy something behind the goal (no visualisation, no breathing exercises here) and just seems to be having the time of his life out in the middle of all that noise and heat.

It is still slightly baffling that Kylian Mbappé or Vinícius Júnior are talked up so often as the best attacking footballers in the world. Mbappé in particular has an impressively powerful multi‑platform celebrity machine at his back. But Salah has been top gun, the best attacking player in the world this season; and arguably the most decisive presence in any elite European team for much of the past five years.

Not that those higher registers were needed here. On a day when the task for City was simply to look like a functioning entity, Pep Guardiola picked an end‑of‑term kind of team, all fun attacking angles.

Arne Slot’s Liverpool team was also notable. Once again every player was inherited from his predecessor. At least five of them are now playing in slightly altered roles. And Liverpool’s manager deserves his slice of credit for Salah’s extraordinary bloom. Slot may have the air of a friendly neighbourhood greengrocer who juggles apples on his forearm, but he has also been sharp and confident enough to fix only the parts that need fixing. Salah has been asked to deliver more of the same, but also freed up by Liverpool’s increased patience on the ball to become more of an actively creative influence.

Salah-dependence is clearly a thing. How could it not be? He has either made or scored more than half of Liverpool’s goals this season. And Salah has also carried Slot, has imbued every managerial call with an air of righteousness. You don’t need to possess a fearless dead-eye super-ripped genius-level finisher to build a reputation as a brilliant manager. But it does kind of help.

Liverpool will surely go on to win the league from here. And if it seems a little ominous still that the best attacking player in Europe is yet to sign a new contract, this is perhaps just a time to live for the present, to drink in that age of imperial Salah.

[SB]

Mo missed the chance to go 9 straight games scoring & the Liverpool record is 10 apparently.

[DerKrampus]

Mo missed the chance to go 9 straight games scoring & the Liverpool record is 10 apparently.

League games?

Next up is Southampton, he'll be guaranteed a goal there.

[SB]

League games?

Next up is Southampton, he'll be guaranteed a goal there.

Not sure if it’s league goals or all matches but they’ve bottled it commentator said it on Optussports this morning. And yeah he’s back to zero now so that doesn’t help

[Assassin]

I think tonight just illustrated the contract stand off. Yes, he’s having another great season. But, look at PSG’s wide players tonight. Young, direct, dynamic, energetic, causing continual havoc…. I can see Slot wanting that……

[Tatterdemalion]

I think tonight just illustrated the contract stand off. Yes, he’s having another great season. But, look at PSG’s wide players tonight. Young, direct, dynamic, energetic, causing continual havoc…. I can see Slot wanting that……

He's great. Still. But won't be for much longer. We need to invest in the future, not the past.

[Assassin]

He's great. Still. But won't be for much longer. We need to invest in the future, not the past.

Agree, there’s so much great young talent out there

[danperkins]

He had a bad game, like most of our lads. He was left completely isolated and played vs a speedy fullback who gave him nothing. He had a stinker but he's been outstanding this season, and last season, and the season before etc etc

Whether we can give him a bumper new contract at his age is another story.