Mohamed Salah was in scintillating form as Liverpool tore apart Sparta Prague in the second-leg of their Europa League meeting.
Mohamed Salah has smashed a 37-year record at Liverpool, becoming the first player to bag 20 or more goals in seven consecutive seasons. In blistering form against Sparta Prague in their Europa League match, Salah joined the likes of Darwin Nunez and Bobby Clarke on the scoreboard.
Sparta Prague gifted Salah the ball near the goal line due to an obvious mistake, and the clinical striker didn’t disappoint with his finish. The 31-year-old star’s current season tally is now 20 goals and 10 assists in all competitions.
This is the seventh time in a row that the Egyptian magician has hit the 20-goal mark for the Reds – a feat no other player wearing the famous red shirt has managed before. Former forward Ian Rush previously held the record, scoring 20 or more goals for six successive seasons from 1981-82 until 1986-87.
Despite struggling with some injury troubles this campaig Salah continues to shine. Before the game, Jurgen Klopp said: “It’s possible it would have been possible for him to play longer in the last game [against City], but it was just the game, how it was.”
The Egyptian has missed Liverpool’s last two matches with a groin injury but Klopp has confirmed that he is now back in contention.
Klopp told reporters on Friday: “It’s important that we build up Mo, obviously super-important, but in this game changing at half-time was not necessary or possible [because] we have to deal with changes carefully. So, yeah, he is ready.
“He is top fit, everything is good now and we don’t have to deal with these kind of things anymore. I’m not sure if he is ready for 90 minutes and I’m not sure we should do 90 minutes, but he’s ready to start so that’s how it is.
The Egyptian has missed Liverpool’s last two matches with a groin injury but Klopp has confirmed that he is now back in contention.
Klopp told reporters on Friday: “It’s important that we build up Mo, obviously super-important, but in this game changing at half-time was not necessary or possible [because] we have to deal with changes carefully. So, yeah, he is ready.
“He is top fit, everything is good now and we don’t have to deal with these kind of things anymore. I’m not sure if he is ready for 90 minutes and I’m not sure we should do 90 minutes, but he’s ready to start so that’s how it is.
“He would have been ready to start in the last game but then you don’t know for how long it makes sense and that’s always the problem when players come back. I can’t remember a game where I thought, ‘Mo Salah cannot play, no problem.’
“It just never happened, so it’s not cool to not have him but there was a game last Sunday and there are 10 more Premier League games and hopefully a lot more cup and European games. They are all as important and Mo was completely fine with that.”
After Salah’s goal, Liverpool’s relentless assault on the Sparta Prague goal continued. Dutch forward Cody Gakpo added a fourth for Liverpool just a matter of minutes later before Veljko Birmančević pulled one back for the visitors to take the aggregate scoreline to 9-2.
