Liverpool 1-4 PSV: Match Review
Mo Salah’s Liverpool form has again come under scrutiny after a 4-1 loss to PSV Eindhoven in the Champions League.
Troy Deeney has agreed with Jamie Carragher and believes that Mo Salah needs to start taking more accountability amid Liverpool’s dire form.
Several players’ form has tanked, with Salah being the main one. The winger fired 34 goals in all competitions last season yet this term he has managed five so far. For PSV’s second goal, he was skipped past far too easily by Mauro Junior.
Salah has started all but two of Liverpool’s Premier League and European games this term. The most recent was a 5-1 win at Eintracht Frankfurt after which he removed mentions of Liverpool in the bios of his X and Instagram profiles - and Deeney suggested that is a problem for Slot.
What’s been said
Speaking on CBS Sports, the former Watford striker said: “Last year, we decided Salah was the best, he was not looking old, give him three years. They wanted to give him two years, remember that was the argument, he wanted three. When he gets all the adulation for the things he was doing last year, now the spotlight is what he’s not doing. He's in this situation where he's not performing but he's not doing interviews. He's not taking accountability of going: 'Don't let Curtis Jones do it, I'll go and stand out'.
He's been dropped once against Frankfurt and deleted all of his Instagram posts. OK, so arguably the best player Liverpool have ever had, if I (Arne Slot) don't treat him the way he wants to, he pulls his toys out of the pram. Now what do you do? It sets a precedent to the rest of the people. I'm not questioning his professionalism because you can see how he looks after himself, but you can't put him on the bench because he acts this way and spits his toys out of the pram.”
‘A liability’
Salah was afforded more attacking freedom after Slot took over the Anfield hot seat from Jurgen Klopp, which yielded his second-best goalscoring return since joining Liverpool from AS Roma in 2017.
But with Salah’s output diminishing in the final third, his defensive flaws have been highlighted. After a 2-1 loss to Chelsea last month, left-back Marc Cucurella admitted that his side exposed the space left by Salah.
Nigel Reo-Coker reckons Salah would have been dropped but for his past achievements. The former West Ham midfielder said: “When we say about Mo Salah last year and how much of a defensive liability he is, this year it is even worse he's not coming back and now he's not scoring goals.
“He masked it last year because he was scoring but now teams are playing do that. Chelsea did so and now he's a liability and other teams are catching up and exposing that. When other players are not playing to the levels... the players need to be more accountable. There are times when people have said Mo Salah should have been dropped and that is the reality.”
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