Mohamed Salah will not be available for Liverpool until February.
How do you deal with a situation when your best player is spending a month away from home? Most likely, hope that the previous instance occurs again.
Despite his prior significance, Mohamed Salah was not missed when he departed for the Africa Cup of Nations in January 2022.
To maintain hopes of winning a quadruple that season, Liverpool won both of their Premier League games and advanced in both of their domestic cup competitions. Salah had left with 16 goals in the league at that point, while Sadio Mane had also scored eight goals.
Even with the likes of Harvey Elliott, Diogo Jota, Luis Diaz, Darwin Nunez, and Cody Gakpo stepping in across the front line, it still feels more significant this time. Salah has been the main player in what is looking like a serious championship challenge for Jurgen Klopp’s team.
When the Reds turned down a £150 million summertime offer from Saudi Arabia for a player who had just turned thirty-one, some laughed. There was discussion over how the Reds could improve other areas by reinvesting such a large amount of money there. Salah is not your typical 31-year-old, though. This attacker still has a lot of life left in him, and his performances reflect it.
He now has 14 goals in the league this season—just two fewer than Gakpo, Nunez, Diaz, and Jota combined—after his two goals against Newcastle. However, his assists have also played a significant role in Liverpool’s early 2024 Premier League leadership.
After Monday night, he has eight. Therefore, of Liverpool’s 43 league goals thus far this season, he has either scored or assisted on 51 percent of them. Now that he is a leader, in addition to being a “goal machine,” Jurgen Klopp called him “quite remarkable”.
Because of the Asia Cup, they will also miss the developing Wataru Endo for a comparable amount of time, but Alexis Mac Allister will fill in at midfield once more. This time, who can step in for Salah in Liverpool’s attack?
Virgil van Dijk remarked, “It goes without saying that we will miss Mo and his leadership qualities as well.” “The circumstances are what they are, and Wataru is no different. It was excellent that other players had to step up and keep themselves fit. Everyone needs to be prepared for Macca and Jota have returned.
Without their talisman, Liverpool will have to deal with an FA Cup match against Arsenal this weekend as well as a two-leg Carabao Cup semifinal against Fulham. Salah might also miss matches in the league against Chelsea, Arsenal, Bournemouth, and Burnley in addition to perhaps playing in the FA Cup fourth round.
He missed just two league games in 2022, against Brentford and Crystal Palace, which greatly decreased the likelihood that his absence would hurt them in the race for the championship that year. The fact that Liverpool has lost their best player in the past and it didn’t ruin their season should give them some comfort.
However, Klopp, the manager of Liverpool, could still be forgiven for wanting that Egypt would lose the continental tournament early.