Mo Salah has been in the headlines for unwanted reasons over the past week as he prepares to conclude his nine-year stay at Liverpool before turning his attention to the World Cup.
Last weekend, the winger took to social media to call for a return to the ‘heavy metal’ football which typified the Jurgen Klopp era at Anfield, with his comments widely interpreted as a veiled swipe at current head coach Arne Slot.
The 33-year-old was duly criticised by numerous pundits for airing his grievances in public, with Wayne Rooney and Sam Allardyce going as far as saying that he should play no part in our season-ending fixture at home to Brentford on Sunday.
While we wait to see what Slot does in terms of Salah’s involvement for that game, his international boss Hossam Hassan seems unperturbed by the Liverpool star’s social media activity.
As per BBC Sport, the Reds forward has been named in Egypt’s preliminary squad for the World Cup, with one of the 27 shortlisted players to be excluded from the final pick for the tournament in North America.
The 33-year-old is due to play in the finals for the second time, having also participated in Russia eight years ago, when he scored twice but his country lost all three group games.
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Salah went to the 2018 World Cup still recovering from the after-effects of Sergio Ramos’ shameful hatchet job in the Champions League final shortly before that tournament, so he and his nation will feel they have some ghosts to lay from that summer.
In contrast to the 44 goals he netted in the season heading into that year’s finals, he’s set to travel across the Atlantic having scored just a dozen times in his final campaign for Liverpool, unless he can add to that tally against Brentford on Sunday.
We don’t know yet whether he’ll get the opportunity to do so, but for all the criticism that he’s taken over his club form and off-field remarks, he remains a talismanic presence for Egypt, scoring four times as captain in their run to the Africa Cup of Nations semi-finals over the winter.
With eight third-placed finishers advancing to the round of 32 and the Pharaohs in a group alongside Belgium, New Zealand and Iran, Salah and his compatriots will feel they ought to progress to the knockout rounds and then strive to emulate Morocco’s exploits in 2022.
Hopefully the Liverpool winger will link up with his country off the back of a goalscoring farewell at Anfield and a rousing send-off from Kopites whose deep-held admiration of him as one of the club’s all-time greats remains unaffected by his social media activity.
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