Topic: Mohamed Salah - Best in the World *

[Draex]

We're not a selling club, Madrid wasn't thinking about what they would get for Modric Benzema or Ronaldo, when they turnt 30 +. they were thinking about how they could add better young players to that core and win more CLs, which they did. Thats how a big club operates, we need to get out of the thinking that we're bleeding Dortmund, FSG and their media stooges has done a number on some peoples psyche.

Real is a poor example, their league is a farmers one, they can regularly rest their older players during easy games and keep them fresh for the big ones and Europe.

We have to play at 1000 miles an hour every single game against game raising c*nts.

[jepovic]

We're not a selling club, Madrid wasn't thinking about what they would get for Modric Benzema or Ronaldo, when they turnt 30 +. they were thinking about how they could add better young players to that core and win more CLs, which they did. Thats how a big club operates, we need to get out of the thinking that we're bleeding Dortmund, FSG and their media stooges has done a number on some peoples psyche.

I think we have sold many of our top scorers in recent time, like Suarez and Torres. Salah is the outlier.

For me it comes down to what he wants. Is he ok with not being a guaranteed starter, playing less and not being the main guy? And being paid accordingly?

[Coolie High]

I think we have sold many of our top scorers in recent time, like Suarez and Torres. Salah is the outlier.

For me it comes down to what he wants. Is he ok with not being a guaranteed starter, playing less and not being the main guy? And being paid accordingly?

Why would he not be a guaranteed starter hes our best attacker, most goals, most assists, most chances created.... Bizarre, we're having the same arguments as last season even though that fact still remains.

[killer-heels]

I think we have sold many of our top scorers in recent time, like Suarez and Torres. Salah is the outlier.

For me it comes down to what he wants. Is he ok with not being a guaranteed starter, playing less and not being the main guy? And being paid accordingly?

To be fair we were shit for ages after selling those players.

Under Klopp’s time, we have sold players but never our best attacker. I want us to keep Salah and bring in another top attacker but realistically with the way we have been signing players its very likely that come the start of pre season, Salah is still our best attacker.

[Coolie High]

Real is a poor example, their league is a farmers one, they can regularly rest their older players during easy games and keep them fresh for the big ones and Europe.

We have to play at 1000 miles an hour every single game against game raising c*nts.

La Liga is not a farmers league.

You think they don't have to play against game raising c*nts either?

[jepovic]

Why would he not be a guaranteed starter hes our best attacker, most goals, most assists, most chances created.... Bizarre, we're having the same arguments as last season even though that fact still remains.

Im thinking a bit into the future here, because he would need a new contract to stay.

He needs to rest more, and wont be able to start every game. Maybe he will still start all the top games, but his days of 2x90 min a week are over. That will make it harder for him to score 20 goals a season.

[Legs]

La Liga is not a farmers league.

You think they don't have to play against game raising c*nts either?

Farmers league is becoming a really tedious thing to say its Twitter bantz what isnt and never was funny.

Without Klopp this is a "farmers league" isnt it and too many people buy into the marketing bullshit from Sky/TNT.

Yes PL has most money tv wise but look at the financial state of clubs in England its a mess.

Anyway onto Salah I want him to stay and cant help thinking like 2 years ago the AFCON has fcuked him....ppl always say he is only missing 3/4 games etc yes true but its the state he comes back in.

If someone drops £80-100m down then the club have a big call to make.

[Draex]

Farmers league is becoming a really tedious thing to say its Twitter bantz what isnt and never was funny.

Without Klopp this is a "farmers league" isnt it and too many people buy into the marketing bullshit from Sky/TNT.

Yes PL has most money tv wise but look at the financial state of clubs in England its a mess.

Anyway onto Salah I want him to stay and cant help thinking like 2 years ago the AFCON has fcuked him....ppl always say he is only missing 3/4 games etc yes true but its the state he comes back in.

If someone drops £80-100m down then the club have a big call to make.

What a crock of shit, it's a reference to leagues where the money pumped in is disproportionately funnelled to one or two teams - La Liga, Bundesliga, Ligue 1.

There is a reason why Leverkusen win this season is such an epic achievement, similar when Atletico did.

The point being raised is even the bottom three teams in the Premiership give you an incredibly hard game, you don't get that in the three leagues mentioned above, look at how much money is spent by the Premiership every window v's the other leagues.

Anyone saying a game v's a La Liga relegation club compared to a Premiership one is comparable is frankly talking shit.

[jepovic]

To be fair we were shit for ages after selling those players.

Under Klopp’s time, we have sold players but never our best attacker. I want us to keep Salah and bring in another top attacker but realistically with the way we have been signing players its very likely that come the start of pre season, Salah is still our best attacker.

Sure, but saying that we are not a selling club is just wrong.

IMO we and Salah have to make a choice, because his contract is running out. Letting him leave free is too expensive.
If he stays on a new contract, we have to try to project his performance a few years into the future. He will probably still be very good, but play less and score less.

But of course, maybe it will end with a one year extension.

[Legs]

What a crock of shit, it's a reference to leagues where the money pumped in is disproportionately funnelled to one or two teams - La Liga, Bundesliga, Ligue 1.

There is a reason why Leverkusen win this season is such an epic achievement, similar when Atletico did.

The point being raised is even the bottom three teams in the Premiership give you an incredibly hard game, you don't get that in the three leagues mentioned above, look at how much money is spent by the Premiership every window v's the other leagues.

Anyone saying a game v's a La Liga relegation club compared to a Premiership one is comparable is frankly talking shit.

No it isnt its an opinion.

Talking of money the gap between City and all the others at bottom is bigger lets not forget the figures we see for them arent the real ones.

Lets not over rate our league too much Sheff Utd / Burnley arent much better than La Liga sides lets be right.

Its a completely arrogant view of people in this country if all these leagues are farmers leagues then why is the PL stocked full of players from them

I hope it all crashes in the PL I really do.

[mickeydocs]

This is not about being a selling club or not. Mo has by far the biggest contract at LFC. He is rewarded handsomely for his contribution to the club.
He is an absolute legend of this club, but we have made decisions to sell legends in the past.
The eye test suggests he has lost pace and is adapting his game. What is he worth to Liverpool as someone that creates assists and scores goals.
How much of our setup is about getting the most out of Mo? Could we benefit from a change of approach?
During his absence earlier this year we started scoring goals for fun. Why did both Nunez and Jota score more goals during this period. Is there enough data to determine if this could be sustained.

Salah will have 12 months left on his contract this summer. We as a club have an enormous decision to make as does Mo Salah. It will be a fascinating insight into how the club will be run by Edwards and Hughes.

[Coolie High]

This is not about being a selling club or not. Mo has by far the biggest contract at LFC. He is rewarded handsomely for his contribution to the club.
He is an absolute legend of this club, but we have made decisions to sell legends in the past.
The eye test suggests he has lost pace and is adapting his game. What is he worth to Liverpool as someone that creates assists and scores goals.
How much of our setup is about getting the most out of Mo? Could we benefit from a change of approach?
During his absence earlier this year we started scoring goals for fun. Why did both Nunez and Jota score more goals during this period. Is there enough data to determine if this could be sustained.

Salah will have 12 months left on his contract this summer. We as a club have an enormous decision to make as does Mo Salah. It will be a fascinating insight into how the club will be run by Edwards and Hughes.

It is about being a selling club, because the big clubs generally do not sell their best players, when they're on course to have one of the best seasons of their career.... All the talk has been about raising money, and investing in younger worse players, thats exactly the modus operandi of the likes of Dortmund Atletico and Arsenal of yesteryear, if we were being rational we shouldn't have to sell Salah to improve on the team and squad, and as one of our best players he should be one of the last players we're looking to sell.

[JackWard33]

No idea what we do with him re contracts etc

But I do want to push back on the idea he's dropped off.. there's no evidence for that beyond someone's opinion watching him
By every metric we have that's important he's produced at an elite level this season and most of his output has gone up compared to last year

[Legs]

No idea what we do with him re contracts etc

But I do want to push back on the idea he's dropped off.. there's no evidence for that beyond someone's opinion watching him
By every metric we have that's important he's produced at an elite level this season and most of his output has gone up compared to last year

Exactly.

To the eye test if you asked most who out of our CMs who does most running work / pressing I think most would say Dom as he has a good engine.

It is actually Elliott and Jones on the stats providing what Seb Hutchinson said is true !

[Draex]

No idea what we do with him re contracts etc

But I do want to push back on the idea he's dropped off.. there's no evidence for that beyond someone's opinion watching him
By every metric we have that's important he's produced at an elite level this season and most of his output has gone up compared to last year

He is easily a yard or two slower than he was before the AFCON/injury.

It's a good job our club uses a mix of data and good old eyesight.

[JackWard33]

He is easily a yard or two slower than he was before the AFCON/injury.

If so , its injury related, that will be temporary though right? - I was talking about the idea he's declined due to age this season which isn't apparent

[Draex]

If so that will be temporary though right? - I was talking about the idea he's declined due to age this season which isn't apparent

That's the point isn't it, if it's permenant it's a worry, if he recovers it then it's not.

Watching him get caught by proper cloggers is horrible

[Knight]

Ah here we go. Jack I've been wanting to ask you this. Ronaldo put up some really good numbers for Utd when he came back didn't he? That is, his xGA was good. But he was a nightmare for them because he was static artillery in effect and, despite the numbers, made them worse. So we accept it's possible to be putting up good production numbers and actually be hindering the team. Given I'm guessing you don't have access to more data than FBref provides re Salah how you can be so sure he's not continuing to put up good numbers but beginning to hinder the team? Does the data we do have (eg shot creating actions etc) do enough to assuage my worry that he's beginning to be less helpful for us (albeit with good production still)?

And if it does in an on the ball sense what about an off the ball sense given Klopp's template? If Salah isn't doing the off the ball work so much anymore (and isn't the out ball so much either - which he definitely isn't, the eye test tells us that as well as Nunez's different role to Firmino's) isn't that a real issue?

[Kashinoda]

Should comfortably have double the assists and be well clear on g/a this season:
https://www.reddit.com/r/LiverpoolFC/comments/1c51jc7/some_of_the_chances_salah_created_for_the_team_pl/

[JackWard33]

Ah here we go. Jack I've been wanting to ask you this. Ronaldo put up some really good numbers for Utd when he came back didn't he? That is, his xGA was good. But he was a nightmare for them because he was static artillery in effect and, despite the numbers, made them worse. So we accept it's possible to be putting up good production numbers and actually be hindering the team. Given I'm guessing you don't have access to more data than FBref provides re Salah how you can be so sure he's not continuing to put up good numbers but beginning to hinder the team? Does the data around shot creating actions etc do enough to assuage my worry that he's beginning to be less helpful for us (albeit with good production still)?

And if it does in an on the ball sense what about an off the ball sense given Klopp's template? If Salah isn't doing the off the ball work so much anymore (and isn't the out ball so much either - which he definitely isn't, the eye test tells us that as well as Nunez's different role to Firmino's) isn't that a real issue?

I don't have a good answer on this sorry relating team performance to individual performance is really hard all we can really do is look at outputs
We basically have an elite attack this season and Salah's put up elite production so beyond that I'm not sure how the kind of drop off you're describing would be reflected?
To me our problems are defensive but no one seems to want to discuss this much .. Salah's been a huge net plus to the team from what I can tell

None of this is a comment on coming years - father time remains undefeated and he will decline.
Clearly he's not as quick as he was but he's plenty quick enough to get on the ball in dangerous areas and he's been an elite 10/second striker this season dunno beyond that

[Legs]

Ronaldo is bit different to Salah though for a start he was 36/37 at United and Salah is only 31 and is an assist machine too something nobody would ever say about Ronaldo.

Also Ronaldo has never been known for tracking back ever whilst Salah still does this for us but maybe not as much as before

I think we do need another forward with pace but id be very wary of selling Salah unless the offer is stupid.

[Knight]

I don't have a good answer on this sorry relating team performance to individual performance is really hard all we can really do is look at outputs
We basically have an elite attack this season and Salah's put up elite production so beyond that I'm not sure how the kind of drop off you're describing would be reflected?
To me our problems are defensive but no one seems to want to discuss this much .. Salah's been a huge net plus to the team from what I can tell

None of this is a comment on coming years - father time remains undefeated and he will decline.
Clearly he's not as quick as he was but he's plenty quick enough to get on the ball in dangerous areas and he's been an elite 10/second striker this season dunno beyond that

Yeah tricky. I think we can theory our way to having problems with a wide forward who isn't very quick anymore. But then you come back round to the actual production and it feels reasonable to say, 'but it's clearly not an issue'. Or you can theory your way to having 2 players who aren't brilliant off the ball (Nunez and Salah) being an issue but we don't have the data to tell us whether this is actually true. I agree our problems are defensive but I suspect this includes the forward line. When you put a few players in midfield who aren't athletes, combine it with a few players up front who aren't naturally great pressers and aren't as athletic as they were and then play Klopp's counter pressing style you're inevitably going to have problems.

[JackWard33]

Yeah tricky. I think we can theory our way to having problems with a wide forward who isn't very quick anymore. But then you come back round to the actual production and it feels reasonable to say, 'but it's clearly not an issue'. Or you can theory your way to having 2 players who aren't brilliant off the ball (Nunez and Salah) being an issue but we don't have the data to tell us whether this is actually true. I agree our problems are defensive but I suspect this includes the forward line. When you put a few players in midfield who aren't athletes, combine it with a few players up front who aren't naturally great pressers and aren't as athletic as they were and then play Klopp's counter pressing style you're inevitably going to have problems.

Maybe.. although Darwin presses a lot no idk about the quality of his press but he does it more than Diaz or Mo ... I think we've got him pressing too much as it goes. I don't want my biggest shot producer gassed / subbed on 60 regularly
As for the overall structure of the team you probably do give up a chunk having a defensive turnstile like Mo at wide forward.. but then we always have
Agree overall on the defensive stuff - and we haven't been bad defensively.. just clearly not as good as going forward 

[Coolie High]

Ah here we go. Jack I've been wanting to ask you this. Ronaldo put up some really good numbers for Utd when he came back didn't he? That is, his xGA was good. But he was a nightmare for them because he was static artillery in effect and, despite the numbers, made them worse. So we accept it's possible to be putting up good production numbers and actually be hindering the team. Given I'm guessing you don't have access to more data than FBref provides re Salah how you can be so sure he's not continuing to put up good numbers but beginning to hinder the team? Does the data we do have (eg shot creating actions etc) do enough to assuage my worry that he's beginning to be less helpful for us (albeit with good production still)?

And if it does in an on the ball sense what about an off the ball sense given Klopp's template? If Salah isn't doing the off the ball work so much anymore (and isn't the out ball so much either - which he definitely isn't, the eye test tells us that as well as Nunez's different role to Firmino's) isn't that a real issue?

Ronaldo wasn’t as creative as Salah, at United he wasn’t one of the better final third  playmakers in the league. Salah is a duel threat even if he lacks a bit of pace like before, you can only compare him to a Ronaldo at Madrid not at United.

[Knight]

Ronaldo wasn’t as creative as Salah, at United he wasn’t one of the better final third  playmakers in the league. Salah is a duel threat even if he lacks a bit of pace like before, you can only compare him to a Ronaldo at Madrid not at United.

Yeah true, the dual threat thing is big. When he's on (and sometimes even when he isn't but finds a worldie of a pass in a game), his creative passing is a huge weapon.

Maybe.. although Darwin presses a lot no idk about the quality of his press but he does it more than Diaz or Mo ... I think we've got him pressing too much as it goes. I don't want my biggest shot producer gassed / subbed on 60 regularly
As for the overall structure of the team you probably do give up a chunk having a defensive turnstile like Mo at wide forward.. but then we always have
Agree overall on the defensive stuff - and we haven't been bad defensively.. just clearly not as good as going forward

Interesting re Nunez's pressing. Feels like we're in transition from Salah being our 'tip of the spear' player to Nunez doing it. The 'tip of the spear' is your cheat player with the press to some extent and is freed from defensive duties to some degree too. Increasingly we probably want Nunez doing it because he's got the athletic attributes. Is Salah still 'cheating' too? Can he become more of a workhouse like Mane and Firmino used to be for him? Has he become that already? If he can't, can we carry 2 players who 'cheat'?

[elkun]

Yeah true, the dual threat thing is big. When he's on (and sometimes even when he isn't but finds a worldie of a pass in a game), his creative passing is a huge weapon.

Interesting re Nunez's pressing. Feels like we're in transition from Salah being our 'tip of the spear' player to Nunez doing it. The 'tip of the spear' is your cheat player with the press to some extent and is freed from defensive duties to some degree too. Increasingly we probably want Nunez doing it because he's got the athletic attributes. Is Salah still 'cheating' too? Can he become more of a workhouse like Mane and Firmino used to be for him? Has he become that already? If he can't, can we carry 2 players who 'cheat'?

Agree with this one. U only have to look at the game against United. We can all agree that he was pretty poor that game but still came with a fantastic pass in the first few mins of the game to play Dominik 1 on 1.

[Agent99]

Hopefully he retires from the national team. The AFCON has fucked him twice in a row now when he was having a great season.

[Black Bull Nova]

Every player (and I mean everyone) declines at a certain point. Clubs like Liverpool watch the statistics closely and balance off the entry to any down curve against the value of a player. It's a cruel world football. Salah is unusual in that his value is impacted by a couple of things, his name and his religion. Such players are rare (Ronaldo, Messi etc just have their name, albeit bigger).


I've no idea where he is at the moment but I'm sure the club does, especially the new team.

[Andy82lfc]

Hopefully he retires from the national team. The AFCON has fucked him twice in a row now when he was having a great season.

He won't though as he'd likely get hammered by Egypt fans forever, which is funny really as lots of them already rip shreds out of him which I've always found bizarre. So I guess it's imagining how bad he'd get it if he actually gave them something proper to be angry about.

[Haggis36]

This is not about being a selling club or not. Mo has by far the biggest contract at LFC. He is rewarded handsomely for his contribution to the club.
He is an absolute legend of this club, but we have made decisions to sell legends in the past.
The eye test suggests he has lost pace and is adapting his game. What is he worth to Liverpool as someone that creates assists and scores goals.
How much of our setup is about getting the most out of Mo? Could we benefit from a change of approach?
During his absence earlier this year we started scoring goals for fun. Why did both Nunez and Jota score more goals during this period. Is there enough data to determine if this could be sustained.

Salah will have 12 months left on his contract this summer. We as a club have an enormous decision to make as does Mo Salah. It will be a fascinating insight into how the club will be run by Edwards and Hughes.

Yep it's so much more complicated than "we shouldn't be a selling club" or "but his numbers are still good". Whether people like it or not, we are going to have to replace Salah, the only point of debate is when.

He's 32 in the summer, 33 when his current contract expires. The sample size of players who remain genuinely elite when they hit 33/34/35 in this league is vanishingly small, and usually limited to players who play deeper in teams who compromise to facilitate them (Thiago Silva would get destroyed in a Liverpool side, for instance). Honestly I'm struggling to think of really any examples at all. You can chuck names like Kroos and Modric at me, but La Liga is not the same, and there are always outliers. Salah might be an outlier (certainly he is starting from a very high level of fitness) but generally, the majority of players enter a pretty steep decline at this age. Nobody thought Fabinho and Henderson would drop off quite so abruptly - there were signs of them slowing down physically (like there is with Salah), but they almost looked to lose their legs overnight. You also have the issue of older players getting injured more frequently - we saw it with Firmino who was basically perma-fit most of his career with us and then he hit 30 and started picking up loads of muscle injuries. Is Salah's hamstring injury a one-off or a sign of things to come? Because conventional wisdom would suggest it's probably the latter.

I'd like him to stay, partly because I think he still has loads to offer, and partly because I think the chances of a team offering a fee this summer to make it worthwhile is basically zero bar Saudi (and that he'd rather run down his contract and consider his options than go to Saudi now). But we do clearly need to adjust his role - he's providing nothing off the ball these days, and I don't think he's able to regularly outpace defenders these days, so playing him out on the wing feels a waste of time. Maybe a new manager and tactical set-up will be a better fit for him. But then you get into the territory of - does it make sense to be making tactical allowances for a player who's probably only going to be here for one more year? I really, really doubt there will be any appetite to renew Salah at £350k a week at the age of 33, and I don't think it would be fair to complain about that - I don't think even Man City would do that (be interesting to see what they do with De Bruyne, whose contract expires at the same time and who is only 1 year older - I suspect they'll let him leave, even though he's been their best player the past 5 years). It's possible we offer him a 1/2 year extension on dramatically reduced wages, which I doubt he'd accept.

Either way, I think the debate around selling him in the summer needs to be framed around the acceptance that next season is almost certainly his last season with us and it feels like there's a lot of people who still aren't quite there yet. Whether you agree or whether you think the club is behaving cheap/small time is not really relevant - it's by far the most likely outcome. So it's not a simplistic buy/sell argument, it's an argument as to the value (monetary or otherwise) of keeping him for one more season.

[bobadicious]

Should comfortably have double the assists and be well clear on g/a this season:
https://www.reddit.com/r/LiverpoolFC/comments/1c51jc7/some_of_the_chances_salah_created_for_the_team_pl/

Beggers belief that professional footballers can miss some of those chances. Alot of them aren't even hitting the target.

[Coolie High]

Yep it's so much more complicated than "we shouldn't be a selling club" or "but his numbers are still good". Whether people like it or not, we are going to have to replace Salah, the only point of debate is when.

He's 32 in the summer, 33 when his current contract expires. The sample size of players who remain genuinely elite when they hit 33/34/35 in this league is vanishingly small, and usually limited to players who play deeper in teams who compromise to facilitate them (Thiago Silva would get destroyed in a Liverpool side, for instance). Honestly I'm struggling to think of really any examples at all. You can chuck names like Kroos and Modric at me, but La Liga is not the same, and there are always outliers. Salah might be an outlier (certainly he is starting from a very high level of fitness) but generally, the majority of players enter a pretty steep decline at this age. Nobody thought Fabinho and Henderson would drop off quite so abruptly - there were signs of them slowing down physically (like there is with Salah), but they almost looked to lose their legs overnight. You also have the issue of older players getting injured more frequently - we saw it with Firmino who was basically perma-fit most of his career with us and then he hit 30 and started picking up loads of muscle injuries. Is Salah's hamstring injury a one-off or a sign of things to come? Because conventional wisdom would suggest it's probably the latter.

I'd like him to stay, partly because I think he still has loads to offer, and partly because I think the chances of a team offering a fee this summer to make it worthwhile is basically zero bar Saudi (and that he'd rather run down his contract and consider his options than go to Saudi now). But we do clearly need to adjust his role - he's providing nothing off the ball these days, and I don't think he's able to regularly outpace defenders these days, so playing him out on the wing feels a waste of time. Maybe a new manager and tactical set-up will be a better fit for him. But then you get into the territory of - does it make sense to be making tactical allowances for a player who's probably only going to be here for one more year? I really, really doubt there will be any appetite to renew Salah at £350k a week at the age of 33, and I don't think it would be fair to complain about that - I don't think even Man City would do that (be interesting to see what they do with De Bruyne, whose contract expires at the same time and who is only 1 year older - I suspect they'll let him leave, even though he's been their best player the past 5 years). It's possible we offer him a 1/2 year extension on dramatically reduced wages, which I doubt he'd accept.

Either way, I think the debate around selling him next summer needs to be framed around the acceptance that next season is almost certainly his last season with us and it feels like there's a lot of people who still aren't quite there yet. Whether you agree or whether you think the club is behaving cheap/small time is not really relevant - it's by far the most likely outcome. So it's not a simplistic buy/sell argument, it's an argument as to the value (monetary or otherwise) of keeping him for one more season.

Benzema, Messi, Ronaldo, Robben.

De Bruyne is far more injury prone than Salah and i think there is still a big chance he gets a renewed 2 year deal.

[Haggis36]

Benzema, Messi, Ronaldo, Robben.

De Bruyne is far more injury prone than Salah and i think there is still a big chance he gets a renewed 2 year deal.

Ok, do Premier League, where the pace of the game is much higher. There's a reason you won't be able to find many comparable examples.

Benzema was little more than a goal hanger by the end of his time at Madrid. Ronaldo's individual stats remained at a high level right until he left Europe, but he made every team he played for post-Madrid look weaker as a collective. Messi's game never relied on pace and again, he played in a much slower league. Put Salah in Spain I think he'd have another couple of years. Robben's a bad example - by the time he hit 34 he was suffering from absolutely chronic injury issues that basically forced his retirement.

[Coolie High]

Ok, do Premier League, where the pace of the game is much higher. There's a reason you won't be able to find many comparable examples.

Benzema was little more than a goal hanger by the end of his time at Madrid. Ronaldo's individual stats remained at a high level right until he left Europe, but he made every team he played for post-Madrid look weaker as a collective. Messi's game never relied on pace and again, he played in a much slower league. Put Salah in Spain I think he'd have another couple of years. Robben's a bad example - by the time he hit 34 he was suffering from absolutely chronic injury issues that basically forced his retirement.

The reason is probably cause the best players of the last 15 years have all ended up in La Liga. There's no doubt in my mind that all those players would still be great at that age in the PL, as would Kane if he didn't leave for Bayern last summer.

Your opinion on Benzema is really only relevant for his last season, he won the Ballon d'or at 34-35 being one of the most complete strikers in the world, his biggest comparison would have been a Kane or Firmino.

Robben was a player who suffered injuries all throughout his career and was still one of the best wingers in the world from 30-33, losing little of his pace, he was forced into retirement at 34, but Salah isn't that age yet is he, he's 31.

From what i've seen from this season he still has a couple seasons, at this level, basically a couple years still being arguably the best player in the league, for me it would be worth extending his contract for a year or two.

[Haggis36]

The reason is probably cause the best players of the last 15 years have all ended up in La Liga. There's no doubt in my mind that all those players would still be great at that age in the PL, as would Kane if he didn't leave for Bayern last summer.

You can't just conclude that that's the reason just because you can't think of any examples, particularly when there are numerous examples of attacking players playing in this league who fell off a cliff at this age and then either retired or had to move abroad to extend their career a bit.

Aguero (moved to Spain at 33 after City let him leave on a free, retired shortly after). Sanchez (fell off a cliff at 30, moved to Italy 5 years ago where he's still a regular in a slower league). Going back a little further, Van Persie left the league at 31 and moved to Holland to play. Even many of the players you'd be talking about, who moved abroad, that doesn't hold true. You mention Kane (who despite costing £100m, Bayern were only willing to give him a contract to 33) and Firmino (who all but retired from competitive football by moving to Saudi Arabia at 31 because his body was struggling to keep up with PL football). Mane left at 30 not because he was lured abroad, but because those people who were in charge at the club thought he was past it (spoiler alert: he was).

Salah isn't that age yet is he, he's 31.

From what i've seen from this season he still has a couple seasons, at this level, basically a couple years still being arguably the best player in the league, for me it would be worth extending his contract for a year or two.

Sure, but he'll be 33 when his current contract expires in little over a year's time, and we're not going to sanction anything close to £350k a week for someone at that age. You can argue with it as much as you like, but we've seen enough of these owners and know enough of Edwards to know it isn't happening. Primarily because, on the bolded part, that's just now how it works. You can't just look at someone and "think" a player in their 30s will stay at a certain level for years yet and have that be true - just because you can cherry pick 4 or 5 examples of players in entirely different leagues playing to a high level in their mid 30s, it doesn't change the fact that overwhelmingly, this is the age that nearly all players start significantly slowing down and becoming less effective, and that the final drop-off is often steep and incredibly quick.

We were having these exact same debates a year or two ago - some posters pointed to the ages of the likes of Mane, Fabinho and Firmino as being suggestive their legs had gone/were going and you had people just relentessly citing the same handful of exceptions (almost always in other leagues) over and over again as if that completely disproved the fact that nearly all players are well past their peak by 33.

[Coolie High]

You can't just conclude that that's the reason just because you can't think of any examples, particularly when there are numerous examples of attacking players playing in this league who fell off a cliff at this age and then either retired or had to move abroad to extend their career a bit.

Aguero (moved to Spain at 33 after City let him leave on a free, retired shortly after). Sanchez (fell off a cliff at 30, moved to Italy 5 years ago where he's still a regular in a slower league). Going back a little further, Van Persie left the league at 31 and moved to Holland to play. Even many of the players you'd be talking about, who moved abroad, that doesn't hold true. You mention Kane (who despite costing £100m, Bayern were only willing to give him a contract to 33) and Firmino (who all but retired from competitive football by moving to Saudi Arabia at 31 because his body was struggling to keep up with PL football). Mane left at 30 not because he was lured abroad, but because those people who were in charge at the club thought he was past it (spoiler alert: he was).

Sure, but he'll be 33 when his current contract expires in little over a year's time, and we're not going to sanction anything close to £350k a week for someone at that age. You can argue with it as much as you like, but we've seen enough of these owners and know enough of Edwards to know it isn't happening. Primarily because, on the bolded part, that's just now how it works. You can't just look at someone and "think" a player in their 30s will stay at a certain level for years yet and have that be true - just because you can cherry pick 4 or 5 examples of players in entirely different leagues playing to a high level in their mid 30s, it doesn't change the fact that overwhelmingly, this is the age that nearly all players start significantly slowing down and becoming less effective, and that the final drop-off is often steep and incredibly quick.

We were having these exact same debates a year or two ago - some posters pointed to the ages of the likes of Mane, Fabinho and Firmino as being suggestive their legs had gone/were going and you had people just relentessly citing the same handful of exceptions (almost always in other leagues) over and over again as if that completely disproved the fact that nearly all players are well past their peak by 33.

We were having the same debates about Salah, and all of those people who said his legs were gone had drop a level, we will and should sell him were wrong.

Salah is not Mane Firmino or Fabinho. till date he hasn't had a bad season, all those players showed signs of decline before their last season at this club.

[Haggis36]

We were having the same debates about Salah, and all of those people who said his legs were gone had drop a level, we will and should sell him were wrong.

Salah is not Mane Firmino or Fabinho. till date he hasn't had a bad season, all those players showed signs of decline before their last season at this club.

Right, but the debate you seem to want to have is should we spend £350k a week to extend Salah until he is 34-35. Or let's say £200k a week, assuming he's willing to drop his salary by over a third. His level last year, or his level this year, has no real bearing on his level in 1/2/3 years time - pretty much the only thing that has a bearing is his age, and that's not subjective nor can you argue it - 99% of players are well past their best by 33/34. You can't find me single example of someone who was still elite in this league at 33/34 and only a handful in slower, weaker leagues - certainly as far as recent history goes.

The point around Fimino and Fabinho, is that yes there were signs of declining physicality (which is 100% true of Salah, btw) but they dropped off a cliff very suddenly. I mean we went from saying Fabinho was one of the best #6s in the world to saying he was absolutely finished in the space of less 6 months - the point is those are the kind of drop offs that can happen at this age. How Salah was playing before Christmas is irrelevant to how he'll be playing in 2026.

We're clearly not gonna agree and it's probably the last post I'm gonna make in this particular debate because honestly, it's almost certainly a moot point - we won't be renewing his contract regardless of what you or I think. He'll either stay for one more year and then leave on a free (most likely), or we'll look to sell him this summer.

[Knight]

Right, but the debate you seem to want to have is should we spend £350k a week to extend Salah until he is 34-35. Or let's say £200k a week, assuming he's willing to drop his salary by over a third. His level last year, or his level this year, has no real bearing on his level in 1/2/3 years time - pretty much the only thing that has a bearing is his age, and that's not subjective nor can you argue it - 99% of players are well past their best by 33/34. You can't find me single example of someone who was still elite in this league at 33/34 and only a handful in slower, weaker leagues - certainly as far as recent history goes.

The point around Fimino and Fabinho, is that yes there were signs of declining physicality (which is 100% true of Salah, btw) but they dropped off a cliff very suddenly. I mean we went from saying Fabinho was one of the best #6s in the world to saying he was absolutely finished in the space of less 6 months - the point is those are the kind of drop offs that can happen at this age. How Salah was playing before Christmas is irrelevant to how he'll be playing in 2026.

We're clearly not gonna agree and it's probably the last post I'm gonna make in this particular debate because honestly, it's almost certainly a moot point - we won't be renewing his contract regardless of what you or I think. He'll either stay for one more year and then leave on a free (most likely), or we'll look to sell him this summer.

Brilliant posts Haggis, someone should bookmark and just refer to them whenever the age curve question comes up.

[markmywords]

Right, but the debate you seem to want to have is should we spend £350k a week to extend Salah until he is 34-35. Or let's say £200k a week, assuming he's willing to drop his salary by over a third. His level last year, or his level this year, has no real bearing on his level in 1/2/3 years time - pretty much the only thing that has a bearing is his age, and that's not subjective nor can you argue it - 99% of players are well past their best by 33/34. You can't find me single example of someone who was still elite in this league at 33/34 and only a handful in slower, weaker leagues - certainly as far as recent history goes.

Jamie vardy was 33 when he produced  23 pl gls for leicester, then got an more than admirable 15 pl gls aged 35,  2 yrs later, when they finished 8th

[Haggis36]

Jamie vardy was 33 when he produced  23 pl gls for leicester, then got an more than admirable 15 pl gls aged 35,  2 yrs later, when they finished 8th

I'd question whether he would have got into a City/Liverpool team, but hard to argue with that number of goals, so I'm willing to put that in the column - we have one example.

Vardy is a bit of weird one though, as he didn't come to professional football until he was like 25 iirc? By the end of that season in which he won the golden boot, he'd played 40% less minutes of football than Salah has accumulated over the years, and even now at 37 he's played a lot less than a 31 year-old Salah, by about 20%. But it's true, he held his pace pretty well into his 30s. Problem is, Salah's has already visibly declined - you can debate the extent, but I'm not sure anyone can argue he's still amongst the fastest players in the league.