Arne Slot declined to confirm whether Mohamed Salah has already played his last game for Liverpool after the forward posted on X following the defeat by Aston Villa. The post referenced the club’s former attacking approach and called for a return to that identity.<\/p>\n
Salah wrote: “That is the identity that needs to be recovered and kept for good. It cannot be negotiable and everyone that joins this club should adapt to it.” The message was widely interpreted as a criticism of the manager’s changes to Liverpool’s style this season and has divided players, supporters and club figures. Ex-Manchester United captain Wayne Rooney went in hard on Salah.<\/p>\n
Slot sought to keep focus on the result ahead of Sunday\u2019s home match with Brentford, a game that will determine Liverpool\u2019s Champions League fate. A draw or better will secure qualification, while defeat would leave them vulnerable to being leapfrogged by Bournemouth if the Cherries beat Nottingham Forest. Only goal difference would separate them.<\/p>\n
On selection and the fallout from Salah\u2019s comments, Slot said: “I don\u2019t think it is important what I feel,” adding: “What is [important] is we qualify for the Champions League . I prepare Mo and the rest of the team to be ready.” He stressed a shared objective with the forward: “We want the club to be successful.”<\/p>\n
Slot also referenced last season\u2019s success and the standards expected this term. “We were both part of giving the fans the title last year and we haven\u2019t brought that same level this year. What we all want is to be the same success as last season. Will he play? I never say anything about team selection, so I won\u2019t do that now. A lot of ifs but we know what we need Sunday.”<\/p>\n
Slot suggested the manager-player relationship and training had shown no obvious disruption this week, but he kept team selection private until matchday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Slot refused to say if Salah will play after the forward criticised Liverpool\u2019s attacking style. era<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13979,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[175,969],"tags":[1081,1305,1304],"class_list":["post-13980","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-liverpool","category-premier-league","tag-adaptation","tag-bench-selection","tag-benching"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13980","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13980"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13980\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13979"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13980"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13980"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13980"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}