What Mohamed Salah did after Liverpool winner spoke volumes as new FSG statement sent

Mohamed Salah smashed home the penalty to complete the Liverpool turnaround and picked up the most joyous booking of the season as he celebrated shirtless with those singing his name in the away end. They were scenes reminiscent of a Friday night at this venue five years ago, when a stunning breakaway goal had Reds fans believing that finally the Premier League title was going to be theirs.

And while it was ultimately not quite to be that season as Jurgen Klopp's side finished as runners-up with 97 points, a 3-2 victory against rock-bottom Southampton here at St Mary's means there is a growing belief this time around that Arne Slot's team can sustain their efforts after going eight clear of a Manchester City side veering into crisis territory.

Two more goals for Salah, which came after Adam Armstrong and Mateus Fernandes had cancelled out Dominik Szoboszlai's opener, have taken him up to 12 for the campaign as he registered his 100th away effort for the Reds and 300th of his entire career in the process. Some player.

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By now, the calls for the club to wrap up his new contract are nothing new on these pages but it bears repeating that the Egyptian can speak to clubs outside of England about a free transfer next summer in just five weeks' time. The 32-year-old only has eyes for Anfield presently but the inertia is unsettling for a fanbase desperate to see pen put to paper.

Salah spoke during the international break about the need to discard what he feels is a collective inferiority complex, telling official club channels: "I hate the idea that we're underdogs. No! We have an incredible group. In each position you're going to find a player who is really one of the top three in the world. So, why don't we win it?"

If that was something of a gentle nudge towards what the ambitions of this increasingly intriguing campaign should really be, then his charge towards the away end after his match-winning penalty here was a far more demonstrative way of getting across his point.

There's a Premier League to be won here, you know. Salah certainly knows it. So too those in the corner of St Mary's, who had braved storm-like conditions to make the cross-country trek.

Now eight points clear of a Man City side arriving to Anfield next weekend on the back of a remarkable five-game losing run - and a 4-0 smiting at the hands of Tottenham Hotspur on Saturday - the opportunity to go a barely believable 11 ahead of their rivals is there to be grasped.

To do so, however, performance levels will need to be raised significantly. Liverpool were far from their best defensively or in an attacking sense on the south coast, but on the back of the third international break of the season, a dip in the collective display can be forgiven if the result is ground out, as it very much was.

Southampton have earned plaudits and criticism in equal measure for their way of playing out from the back, but it always looked a high-risk strategy and when Szoboszlai punished a panicked Flynn Downes to open the scoring, it felt inevitable.

The Saints found parity however through a combination of careless and clumsiness from Virgil van Dijk and Andy Robertson and a curious call from VAR Michael Oliver, who decreed there wasn’t enough evidence to overrule referee Sam Barrott’s on-field decision for a penalty after Tyler Dibling had been fouled.

Replays suggested the offence from Robertson - who was trying to bail out Van Dijk’s slack play - happened outside the area only for Oliver to take several looks before ruling there wasn’t enough to go off to change the original call.

Armstrong made it 1-1 after Caoimhin Kelleher had saved the initial penalty and a swift counter-attack involving the impressive Dibling was finished off by Fernandes to shock the league leaders in the second half.

That was the cue for Salah to take centre stage. He made it 2-2 by pouncing on some of Alex McCarthy’s dithering after Ryan Gravenberch’s ball in behind before he rattled home the penalty when substitute Yuki Sugawara had handled inside the area.

Two more goals for the haul and another contribution that could be his most impactful yet this season for Salah. Having spent all season strengthening his hand at the negotiation table, this was another firm statement that club owners Fenway Sports Group must do whatever they can to ensure the next couple of seasons are spent on Merseyside. There are still plenty of chapters yet to write for one of the all-time greats.

Slot has tried to be coy, he has tried to play it down, play it safe and play it sideways, but the Liverpool head coach can no longer ignore the elephant in the room: his team are now right in the thick of a Premier League title challenge.

In fact, with Pep Guardiola's champions on the worst run of his nine-year tenure at the Etihad and visiting a Liverpool team they haven't beaten at Anfield in front of a paying crowd since 2003 next Sunday, there is a genuine suggestion that Slot's team are favourites now.

The Reds boss himself stated on Friday that he found such talk "boring" at this stage of the campaign but there's no way the debate won't be ramped up to deafening levels in the coming days after another major weekend of Premier League results went the way of the leaders.

Try as he might, the genie might already be out the bottle for Slot. Victory next week against Guardiola and fans will have irrefutable evidence to stake their title claims even louder. Salah too.