Liverpool should let Mohamed Salah leave if he’s ‘truly unhappy’, says Robbie Fowler

Liverpool would survive and could even thrive if top-scorer Mohamed Salah left the club, says club legend Robbie Fowler.

The Egyptian attacker has netted more goals this season than any other Premier League player, despite a terrible recent run of form from the team as a whole which has seen the Reds drop down to eighth place in the table.

It means Liverpool are unlikely to make the top four and enjoy Champions League football again next season as things stand, which could potentially lead to top players departing.

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Fowler isn’t advocating an outright forced sale of Salah, but says clubs must accept that individuals will look after their careers.

“I’m not having a go at Salah - I love him to bits - but I truly believe that transfers now are largely about what players want, so the ball is in his court not Liverpool’s,” Fowler wrote in his Mirror column.

“If he wants to go, then he should go. If a player wants to leave, we have to accept it’s in the mix. I’m a firm believer that if they are unhappy and want to be going, then they should be going. Jurgen Klopp has said the same, too – he doesn’t want anyone at the club who doesn’t want to be there.”

Fowler, who now manages in India with SC East Bengal, points to the comparison of when Liverpool sold Philippe Coutinho to Barcelona in 2018.

The Brazilian was a key player for the Reds, but strong reinvestment saw the team become a better all-round unit, while Coutinho himself has since struggled for the most part.

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“Klopp didn’t want Coutinho because he thought his attitude wasn’t right, and he didn’t want that poison in his camp in the end.

“So if Salah is truly ­unhappy, if he is upset he hasn’t been given a new contract or whatever, then cash in, get as much as you can for him and use the money to make tweaks with the current team.

“I’m a fan of Salah, obviously, who wouldn’t be, but Liverpool didn’t miss Coutinho that much, did they? It turned out that he wasn’t quite so good as people thought anyway – the system he was playing in made him look better.

“Perhaps that’s the same with Salah. You’d miss his goals, but is it possible to find someone better – not necessarily as a direct ­replacement, but in strengthening the team as a whole?”

The Reds’ next game is against RB Leipzig, when they will play the last-16 second leg holding two-goal lead from the away tie. Winning the competition would guarantee passage to the group stage for next season, but at present it looks incredibly unlikely that Liverpool will rebound to find top form and turn their season around.

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