It was clear what Liverpool required in the summer of 2017. After an impressive first season following his signing from Southampton, right winger Sadio Mane needed an understudy.
Jurgen Klopp wanted it to be the 21-year-old Julian Brandt from Bayer Leverkusen, but thankfully he was overruled and convinced to go for the 25-year-old Mohamed Salah, previously seen in England when sitting on the Chelsea bench.
And in the nine years that have followed it has been a privilege to watch the greatest Premier League goalscorer who is not from these isles go about his craft.
Scoring goal after goal and posting record after record, Salah has been a force of nature on Merseyside, all while playing with magnetism that made him the favourite of supporters both young and old.
There's a running joke among Liverpool fans about the amount of times a player will be lauded for posting statistics which 'only Mohamed Salah' had bettered, and the frequency with which those words have been repeated underline just what the Reds No.11 has achieved.
Big games have usually resulted in big goals from Kop's Egyptian King over the past near decade, and the three-man band he struck up under Klopp alongside Mane, now moved to the left, and the selfless Roberto Firmino was pure box office.
Better still were the individual heights that Salah hit to power the Reds to the title under Arne Slot last season - 29 goals, 18 assists, the best ever individual Premier League campaign.
Those numbers make any revisionist debate about the merits of giving him a new contract in the summer a non-starter. Fans wouldn't have stood for anything else.
They'll stand and applaud Salah in his final weeks as a Reds player though.
Anfield will say goodbye to a icon, a living legend, and a man who has left his mark on Merseyside and beyond.
Mark is a Content Editor at Reach PLC's Liverpool Hub, and was appointed to the role in 2025. Prior to that appointment he worked solely for the Mirror for nine years, primarily in the role of Sports Features Editor. An experienced sports writer and editor, Mark worked for the Mirror at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar and at Euro 2024 in Germany. A regular contributor to podcasts and videos, his work can be seen both in print and online, and his exclusive interview with the Liverpool captain Virgil van Dijk in April 2024 is one of many successful projects Mark has completed for Reach PLC.
