Liverpool moved eight points clear at the top of the Premier League table with a dominant 5-0 thrashing of West Ham United on Sunday. The Reds extended their unbeaten run to 23 matches as they ran riot at the London Stadium.

Luis Diaz, Cody Gakpo and Mohamed Salah gave Liverpool a convincing lead at the break, before Trent Alexander-Arnold and Diogo Jota wrapped up the scoring. The only blemish for Arne Slot’s men was the sight of Joe Gomez limping off with a hamstring injury in the first half.

And with the Reds having still only lost once under their Dutch head coach to date, the national media were blown away by another convincing display…

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Jason Burt of The Telegraph was left lauding Salah in particular as he wrote: “Liverpool are inevitable. And so is Mohamed Salah and so, unfortunately for them, are West Ham.

“Salah scored his 20th goal of the season, and added two more brilliant assists as the Premier League leaders routinely swept aside a rank West Ham. No player across Europe’s top five leagues can match Salah’s 37 goal contributions so far. The next best is 29.

“This report inevitably must concentrate on the relentlessness of the league leaders – and clear title favourites – and their extraordinary talisman… they are a machine under Arne Slot, with their “Three Kings” of Salah, Luis Diaz and Cody Gakpo all scoring in an embarrassingly one-sided first half that ended with West Ham being booed off. Again.

“But, above all, there is a luminous brilliance to Salah. All he touches turns to gold. And goals. Even he appears surprised by his audacious feats.”

The Times’ Gary Jacob pointed out that Liverpool would ‘have to do a lot wrong’ if they don’t win the Premier League this season.

He wrote: “Arne Slot had a go at his Liverpool players for switching off while they had a comfortable lead over Tottenham Hotspur last week, resulting in a nervous finale, but he did not need to worry about West Ham United mounting a similar fightback at the London Stadium.

“The home stands were virtually empty and subdued long before Diogo Jota swept home Liverpool’s fifth goal of the game, as the visiting team eased to a victory that sent them eight points clear at the top of the Premier League table. It is also the seventh time they have scored three or more goals away from home across all competitions this season.

“Slot has been saying there will be many twists and turns to come, but his side would have to do a lot wrong to blow such an advantage during a season in which everyone else is faltering and struggling with injuries.”

Barney Ronay of The Guardian echoed such sentiments, impressed as Liverpool showed ‘ruthless champion form’ in the capital.

He wrote: “Alexander-Arnold did at least provide a moment of cartoon drama, performing a slightly embarrassed silencing-the-chatter celebration, one hand raised to his ear. Perhaps this was a reference to stories overnight about a move to Real Madrid, something parts of the Spanish media have suggested is all but formalised.

“The result means Liverpool will enter 2025 top of the Premier League by at least seven points, and with at least one game in hand on those in their slipstream. Arne Slot’s team were once again coherent, energetic and well balanced, the goals shared between that re-energised front three. The weather can change, teams can stumble, force majeure can intervene. The rest of the league is going to need help from all three to prevent the five months becoming an extended procession…

“Liverpool Football Club has fallen hard for Slot in the past four months. There has been a dreamy quality to that journey from August sunlight to the chill of December, an unexpected sense of drowning in honey.

“It seems only logical that the world will intrude at some point. It will be necessary to look down, to feel a little vertigo. Success always comes with snags and difficult moments. But it feels a distant hope for the rest of the field. This was slick, ruthless ­champion form, victory with strength in reserve.”

The Daily Mail’s Riath Al-Samarrai believes Liverpool are on a ‘glorious canter’ towards the title after their latest victory.

He wrote: “There will come a moment when Arne Slot discovers that the Premier League isn’t so very easy after all. Days when it is a bit of a slog. But as 2024 ticks its way to 2025, the only question is whether a rival will be within a mile of Liverpool if such a slip occurs.

“For now, we are watching a glorious canter towards the title and an achievement from Slot that is every bit as astonishing as the collapse of Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City.

“With a cushion of eight points, they are turning the screw with brutal relish on all comers, this side that was sensibly tipped to struggle when Jurgen Klopp left but instead got better. Utterly remarkable, really.

“We can balance all of that by saying a 5-0 drubbing of West Ham requires perspective. Because it does. They were useless and Julen Lopetegui’s immediate future will again be plunged into doubt on account of that recurring fact.

“But it was never about them. It was about the unstoppable force of Mo Salah, of an attacking three that generated 22 chances, of a side that is unique in the division for the absence of anything even approaching a wobble. For them to fall from this vantage point feels incredibly unlikely… it is very much Liverpool’s to lose and that is impossible to imagine when Salah is playing like this.”

And finally, The Liverpool ECHO’s own LFC correspondent, Paul Gorst, focused on Salah’s mesmeric performance as his contract saga goes on.

He wrote: “It was another spellbinding performance from the player the supporters so affectionately refer to as the 'Egyptian King' and his enduring brilliance remains undimmed. Having overtaken the great Billy Liddell to move up to fourth in the all-time scoring charts at Anfield in the 6-3 rout of Tottenham last week, victories over Leicester and now West Ham have given the No.11 two more for his account to edge ever closer to Gordon Hodgson in third.

“Salah is now just 10 away and after scoring 20 for an eighth straight campaign, you would not bet against him moving past Hodgson and making third his own before it's all said and done this year. How much further he goes after that depends on what happens over that lingering contract issue.

“Alongside Virgil van Dijk and Trent Alexander-Arnold, it's the one problem that has hung over Liverpool like the Sword of Damocles and with New Year's Day upon us on Wednesday, all three can speaks to clubs outside of England about moving as a free agent in the summer of 2025.

“That should be enough to send shivers down the spines of sporting director Richard Hughes, CEO of football Michael Edwards and the rest of Fenway Sports Group. If the Boston-based organisation are fearful of a sharp decline in output from Salah, who will be 32 in June, then he is showing every single game right now that their concerns are misplaced.”