Pat Nevin has expressed concern about the number of games Mo Salah is being forced to play across his domestic and international commitments.
The Egyptian King hasn’t quite hit the heights of his goalscoring exploits of the first-half of the prior campaign, registering only three efforts across eight appearances (in all competitions).
“I always worry about players like Salah. He never gets a break, he plays over summers, huge numbers of games every year and he’s just human. He’s normal, he’s a bloke,” the BBC pundit told OTB Sports on The Football Show.
“It’s going to wipe him out at some point in time. And there has been games you’ve watched Salah and however brilliant he is, he just looks gone. That’s not me slaughtering him, that’s me saying the guy needs to be managed correctly.
“And I think that’s the case with a number of the players.
“That’s the modern game. It may well be that footballers don’t play 700, 800 or 900 games anymore.”
Admittedly, it has to be noted that the No.11 has suffered in no small part thanks to the wider drop in performance levels across the squad at large with the struggles of the midfield department, in particular, having wider consequences for Jurgen Klopp’s men.
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Having played over 70 games last term, including the AFCON and Champions League finals, tasting defeat in both, it’s clear that an element of fatigue (physical, emotional and mental) has creeped into the 2022/23 term.
The postponement of what would have been our visit to Stamford Bridge on Sunday, however, does hand us a unique chance to rest the squad ahead of what will be an even more frantic remainder of the campaign after the international break.
We’re not too sure we agree with the suggestion that the 30-year-old is being mismanaged – at least as far as Jurgen Klopp is concerned – though there’s no question that an extra handful of days between the meeting with Ajax and our next competitive fixture could do the Egyptian and others the world of good.