Hard Work Fallacy
Mohamed Salah is a legend. He is, without any doubt, the greatest of all of Liverpool’s Premier League players. He will probably go down as, at worst, the second greatest player to ever play for Liverpool, period. His resume is a work of art. He has rightly carved his name in the pantheon of Premier League greats. His name stands proudly alongside the likes of Wayne Rooney, Thierry Henry, Alan Shearer, and Steven Gerrard. In terms of longevity, consistency, output, and prizes, Salah can only be a peer to all-time greats. However, history has shown that even legends can leave the club badly. Fernando Torres, Michael Owen, Steve McManaman, Robbie Fowler, Paul Ince, and most recently, Trent Alexander-Arnold all show that greatness does not always get the send-off it deserves. And, unfortunately, Mo Salah seems determined to add his own name to that list.
READ MORE: Pep Talk by Jack Champagne
SUBSCRIBE & FOLLOW: YouTube / X (Formerly Twitter) / Instagram / TikTok / Patreon / BlueSky
Yellow journalism of all shapes and sizes has permeated throughout this campaign. If it isn’t completely unsubstantiated exit rumors, fake quotes, and misleading headlines, it’s the most shameless outrage bait I’ve ever seen. Basically, every outlet with Kop or Liverpool in its name has degenerated in quality so substantially that they’re practically unreadable. One of the most persistent narratives has been a quiet civil war between Arne Slot and Mohamed Salah. It all started last fall. Salah vented about his benching to the world. Insisting he had been “thrown under the bus,” Mo suggested being scapegoated for the club’s misfortunes.
As disappointment with the season’s progress was beginning to reach a fever pitch, this created a flashpoint. Slot and Salah have been the center of attention as the club’s head coach and star player. This lede proved too juicy to pass up. The tacit question was: whose side are you on? Put more crudely, who do you blame for Liverpool’s fall off?
AMERICAN SCOUSER TAKES ANFIELD
Not helping matters is that the story told about both figures has been extremely elastic. As Mo was shattering records last season, fans were livid that he hadn’t gotten a new contract. Conversely, as the Egyptian King’s form dipped, there were suspicions that he had overperformed to secure a new contract and was resting on his laurels. His output continued to slow into this season, and the notion that Salah was simply past his prime became sticky. But then discontent with Slot started to build. Suddenly, Salah’s decline was a symptom of Slot’s mismanagement of the club. When Salah underperforms on the pitch, he’s a past-his-prime relic who needs benching for the rest of his Liverpool career. When Salah is on the bench, Slot is humiliating a treasured icon of the club.
With Salah’s upset made public, Slot was made the villain in his Liverpool story. But all it took was a few underwhelming performances for that story to shift tones. In particular, the invective directed towards Salah after the FA Cup debacle was atrocious. I was, as is on record, extremely upset by that performance, but the way Salah was singled out was disgraceful. But then he was benched against PSG, and all was forgiven, with anger turned towards Slot once again. The narrative surrounding Salah would not be solidified until he announced his exit from the club.
I kept silent in the face of the announcement because I don’t like to spoil occasions. The departure of such a beloved icon of the club deserved solemnity and respect. Everyone needed space to get their tributes out. But now that we have some distance, I have to be honest. I was extremely disappointed.
THE EGO OF MO
Despite the clear attempt to simply declare that his time at Liverpool had reached its natural conclusion, it is impossible to escape the perception that Mo Salah is quitting.
Faced with a dramatic decline in performance from last season, Salah has opted to give up. No one can really explain what has happened to him, physical decline still seeming unlikely. Whatever the case, Salah is clearly finished trying to work through it, and that’s a shame. Salah’s frustrations have strained his relationship with Arne Slot, with whom he is at odds over playing time. This is not the first time this has happened.
Klopp’s decision to bench Salah towards the end of his final season resulted in a very public falling out. Thankfully, it was resolved behind closed doors. Still, Klopp has expressed that dust-ups over Salah’s playing time were not infrequent. The assumption was that the most recent rift came about by a breakdown of communication due to front office meddling. However, it increasingly seems that Salah’s beef with Slot is personal, as evidenced by their latest indirect exchange.
In a Sky Sports interview, a visibly emotional Salah expressed concerns about the club’s dressing room culture. In a vaguely self-congratulatory fashion, Salah insisted that he set the standard for work. He stated that when he arrived, he ensured that he was always seen working out before training. Salah expressed concerns that this example might not last after his exit, hoping that someone will step up after him. Though never directly mentioning Slot, Salah was widely viewed as sneak-dissing his manager.
AMERICAN SCOUSER YOUTUBE MO SALAH PLAYLIST
This was eagerly snapped up by anyone who believed that declining training standards under Slot are to blame for the horrendous season. Not helping matters was that this is largely in line with what is seen on match day. We all saw the mental fragility, physical sluggishness, and absent leadership. Virgil’s offhand comment about needing changes “behind the scenes” was thought to confirm the belief. The insinuation was that senior players were fed up with Slot. For his part, Slot was seen to have directly responded, alluding strongly to Salah’s comments with his “standards on the pitch” remark. What exactly he meant was unclear, though it was certainly taken to mean that Salah’s performances this season don’t match his big talk.
There’s a lot to unpack in this whole kerfuffle. But the most obvious place to start is that if indeed Salah is directing subliminal jabs at Arne Slot or the younger members of the squad, he’s being massively hypocritical about it. Slot is ultimately correct that you have to set standards on the pitch as well as in the gym. This season, Salah has simply not done this. It’s become fashionable to constantly bring up Florian Wirtz and Alexander Isak’s transfer fees when criticizing their performances. It’s only fair to bring up the fact that Mo Salah is currently the highest-paid player on Liverpool’s squad, and he hasn’t been playing like it.
MOLINEUX à DEUX
Plenty took note that in November, after Salah was sat down, the team’s form spontaneously improved. Additionally, the lack of on-pitch leadership directly implicates Salah, as one of the seniormost players and the star of last season’s run. It’s not enough to lead by example; you have to lead by leadership as well. The notion that doing the most squats and being the first one in the gym can substitute for this is laughable. Additionally, this is a profound insult to all of the younger players who have visibly improved this season.
Of note is Florian Wirtz, who has clearly been hitting the gym hard to adjust to the Premier League. Hugo Ekitike outpaced Salah’s offensive contributions immensely before his injury. And, not to put too fine a point on it, but if Salah was actually as concerned about the club’s standards as he claimed to be, he wouldn’t be leaving for free before his contract was up. This seems less like a concerned club stalwart and more like a snubbed superstar. Mo is once again bitterly tossing a grenade behind him, but this time he won’t be there when it goes off.
That said, it must be acknowledged that Salah’s digs have caught on the way they have because they have the scent of truth about them. Slot can’t really talk about setting standards on the pitch when insipid mediocrity is the order of the day on most matchdays. People see a squad that seems to treat failure as an inevitability, that are outrun by squads that were playing in the Championship last season, and that visibly wilt in the face of adversity. There is a massive leadership gap that needs to be addressed.
LOW EXPECTATIONS
All on-pitch leadership is centralized around Virgil van Dijk, who is palpably exhausted at this stage of the season. Performances rarely improve at half-time, suggesting a squad that is either being misinstructed, fails to understand instruction, or simply doesn’t have the will to carry out instruction. None of those possibilities is good, and all of them are extremely embarrassing. Salah is far from the only one who is playing worse than he did last season, making Slot’s response come across as in very poor taste. Slot wants to build confidence, of course, he does. But he’s not doing so successfully.
Regardless, this has long ceased to be a clash of philosophies. Now it’s a war of personalities. Salah has simply become a figurehead for the increasingly toxic discourse around the way the club is being run. Criticism and disappointment towards Slot’s second season has degenerated into an irrational, personal hatred of the man himself. Hysterical nipicks drown out legitimate criticisms. Anything he says, does, thinks, or implies is read as a sign that he’s completely clueless, deeply stupid, or both. Salah’s comments, sincere as they may have been, have simply fed this wildfire.
FOR STEPH’S SAKE
This is something he should have known would happen, which makes the timing inexcusable. The last thing the club needs right now is public disunity, but Salah has seemingly made up his mind that this isn’t his problem. I’d be genuinely surprised if this represented an actual dressing room rebellion. For one thing, it’s hopefully beneath Salah to be so petty as to set fire to the club to avenge a personal slight. For another, that discussion came and went last year. It was made clear that if indeed a Salah-led revolt was afoot, no one else had taken the bait. All of van Dijk, Gravenberch, Szoboszlai, and Wirtz have publicly made their allegiance to the manager known, and that does not appear to have changed. Salah quietly apologized to the squad for his outburst, and that was the end of it.
The real tragedy is that this type of dispute helps no one. There’s an entire generation of players who hate Gerard Houllier for making hard but necessary decisions. Nevertheless, he is the most successful pre-Klopp manager of the Premier League era. Robbie Fowler has nothing to show for his dispute with Houllier except for a long-standing bitterness. Nevertheless, fans fondly remember both.
A dressing room rebellion from a squad that refused to accept his discipline victimized Xabi Alonso. As a result, Real Madrid lost one of the most promising young coaches in the world because firing the manager was easier than telling their overpaid divas to grow up and act like professionals. No one is better off for it, least of all Real Madrid. Now he’s going to have to fight an uphill battle at Chelsea.
SHOP THE AMERICAN SCOUSER COLLECTION TODAY
The same is true here. Pro-Slot or anti-Slot, everyone is worse off for this dispute. The last thing the fanbase needs is more division, more reasons to aimlessly complain, to actively hate the club they claim to support. Whatever Salah intended, this is what he has done.
I love Mo Salah. I want him to be happy wherever he goes. We all hope he breaks more Premier League records before his departure. I hope he has a successful end to his career. I’m rooting for him to lift the AFCON next time around. I respect his upright character and charitable nature. But before I am a Mo Salah fan, and indeed after, I’m a fan of Liverpool FC.
Both Salah and Slot have let the club down this season, but at least Slot wants a chance to make it right. He wants to stick it out with Liverpool despite the chorus of negativity that follows him everywhere. Ajax came calling, and he said no. Salah wants to leave and publicly litigate his personal disputes on the way out. Salah didn’t have any problems with Slot last season when we were winning. Now, suddenly, there’s a crisis that coincides with his exit. Loyalty to Liverpool comes first in my book.