Former Liverpool forward, El-Hadji Diouf has stressed that no matter how good Mohamed Salah is, he cannot get the kind of contract he wants at the Premier League club.
Recall that Mohamed Salah joined Liverpool from an Italian club AS Roma on July 1, 2017, for a transfer fee worth €42 million.
Since then, he has been able to establish himself as the most important player at the club. So far in his career at Anfield, Salah has been able to score 153 goals and provided 57 assists in 239 games in all competitions.
His effort has helped the club to win one Premier League title, one UEFA Champions League, one UEFA Super Cup, and one FIFA Club World Cup.
Due to how important he has been for the club so far, Liverpool have been making efforts to renew the contract of the 29-year-old Egyptian football star which will expire on June 30, 2023.
The Egyptian international who will turn 30-year-old on June 15, wants the club to pay him nothing less than £400,000 per week in the proposed contract. But Liverpool which currently pay Mohamad Salah £200,000 per week are not ready to pay the Egyptian as much as he is asking for.
Mohamed Salah’s agent, Ramy Abbas Issa has reportedly turned down a couple of offers Liverpool have made for the football star because the offers are not close to what the footballer wants.
In an interview recently, the coach of Liverpool, Jurgen Klopp said Liverpool would not be able to do as much as Salah expects the club to do, adding that there was no rush to renew Salah’s contract.
The coach said: “Mo expects this club to be ambitious. We cannot do much more. It is Mo’s decision. It is all fine from my point of view. Nothing happened further, no signing or rejection. We just have to wait, there’s no rush.”
On the contrary, Mohamed Salah said recently that the decision to stay or leave the club was not in his hands, adding that he could not see himself playing against the club.
“At the moment I can’t see myself ever playing against Liverpool. That would make me sad…. let’s see what will happen in the future”, he said.
Due to how good he has been at Liverpool, he is said to be highly wanted at Real Madrid and FC Barcelona. Hence, if the Spanish giants can pay him what Liverpool are not ready to pay, he could exit the Premier League anytime soon.
El-Hadji Diouf’s argument on the contract tussle between Liverpool and Mohamed Salah
Based on statistics, Mohamed Salah is not just the best player at Liverpool, he is currently the best player in the Premier League.
So far this season, he has scored 20 league goals in 27 games which makes him the highest goalscorer in the Premier League. He has also provided 10 assists, which is the second-highest at Liverpool, one assist lower than that of Trent Alexander Arnold.
Despite such stats, Liverpool are not willing to pay him anything close to the second-highest-paid player in the Premier League, Kevin De Bruyne who reportedly earns £400,000 per week at Manchester City.
El-Hadji Diouf believes that Mohamad Salah ought to be rubbing shoulders with the Premier League’s highest-paid player, Cristiano Ronaldo who reportedly earns £510,000 per week at Manchester United based on Salah’s form.
However, Diouf who played for Liverpool between 2002 and 2005 argued that the fact that Mohamed Salah is from Africa would prevent him from being treated like other A-list players.
Diouf, a retired Senegalese footballer who is now an entrepreneur and a sports adviser to Senegalese President Macky Sall said he also encountered the same issue while playing at Liverpool.
Despite saying Salah would not be treated as he ought to at Liverpool, the two times African footballer of the year urged Salah to remain at Liverpool for four more years.
“If I were Salah, I would stay at Liverpool, he can make more money, he is the best player at the club with [Sadio] Mane, and with him, they will win a lot of trophies”, Diouf told BeIN Sports.
“He’s 30 years old [in June], and I’m asking him to play 4 more years with the Reds. A transfer to Real Madrid will mean he will have to start all over again. …
“Salah has to realize that he is African, so they will not treat him like the Europeans, and they will not give him the best contract like the others. The same thing happened to me when I was at Liverpool, they told me not to go to my country to play with my national team.”
Salah to fight Senegal for a 2022 FIFA World Cup ticket
Mohamed Salah is currently on international duty with Egypt. The Egyptian team are currently in Dakar to play Senegal in the second leg of the FIFA World Cup play-off.
The first leg ended 1-0 in favor of Egypt which means that a draw will be enough to hand over the World Cup ticket to the Egyptian team.
Senegal vs Egypt play-off will kick off at 18:00 later tonight, March 29, 2022. Tonight, one of Liverpool’s superstars, Mohamed Salah of Egypt or Sadio Mane of Senegal will lose the 2022 FIFA World Cup ticket.
The Egyptian king 🤴 🇪🇬
— MoHmEd 🇪🇬❤🇲🇦 (@79moameeno) March 28, 2022
Mohamed salah the best player in the world
Just enjoy 😉 pic.twitter.com/rxzWE6rBVG
