Mohamed Salah will be absent for Liverpool‘s journey to Brighton and Hove Albion on Saturday and will also miss Egypt’s friendly against Spain over the international break. Reds talisman Salah requested to be replaced shortly after scoring in Wednesday’s 4-0 triumph over Galatasaray in the Champions League, and has now been declared unfit for the excursion to the south coast by Arne Slot.
Addressing his press conference on Friday, Slot stated: « It is unusual [Salah is injured], I think you expect the outcome so he is not available for tomorrow. The good thing for us is we go to international break, bad news for Egypt, he can’t go there. We hope with what Mo has shown in the past he can recovery faster than other players. He takes such good care of his body, he can be back earlier than others as history has shown. Only two weeks until we go again… »
Slot subsequently confirmed that Salah is suffering from a muscle problem, whilst the Reds manager also addressed the fitness of Joe Gomez, who was included in the squad against Galatasaray but remained unused on the substitutes’ bench.
« Joe wasn’t able to come in, we tried to postpone it as often we could, » said Slot. « He might be – might be – available tomorrow but not to start. »
Reflecting on Salah’s performance against Galatasaray, where he registered a goal and an assist following a missed penalty, Slot said: « His first half was not too bad, the whole team played well. Individuals, it’s helpful if the teams play well.
« They can then shine. It says a lot about his mental strength but that comes with age. If you miss chances, older you get, you get better at handling situations like this. He has always done this really well. He has done this so well in his career, to shut it down and create a goal and an assist, it is the experience he has.
« It says a lot about him that after missing a penalty just before half-time [to score that goal]. That can sometimes be hard for an individual or for a team, so compliment to the team for how we came out in the second half because we’ve had a lot of setbacks this season.
« We’ve had a lot of first or second halves where we’ve created chance after chance after chance without doing justice to how we’ve performed, so not scoring.
« Then, Mo and the team came out in the second half the way they did. He assisted first to Hugo, a great assist, and then scored a trademark goal, which he scored many of in this stadium and for this club, coming inside and finding the top corner.
« That tells you about the mental strength of him, but definitely also of the team because adversity is something we can talk about when it comes to this season. »
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