- 7 hours ago
Following Mo Salah's bombshell interview after the Leeds game, Arne Slot has made the decision to leave him out of the squad to play Inter Milan. But after 3 games on the bench, has his omission actually improved Liverpool?Adam Clery examines if the Egyptian has become a problem for his teammates, or if he's been unfairly scapegoated for their disappointing season.
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00:00Right, hello everybody, welcome to the award-winning, and I'll stop saying that very soon, I promise, Adam Cleary Football
00:06Channel and Mo Salah.
00:10Of all the videos I expected to be doing this season, one about whether or not he is responsible for
00:16Liverpool being mired in mid-table and on a run of something like two wins in the last 12 games,
00:22and whether booting him out of the starting XI and potentially the club will save Arna Slotty's job, then, yeah,
00:31yeah.
00:32Basically, does setting Liverpool up like this, with Dominic Sabaslay replacing Mo Salah, actually fix any of the issues they're
00:39currently experiencing,
00:40or is the problem more about a number of underperforming other players throughout the XI?
00:46Well, I am going to give you as many facts as I possibly can, and then we can decide.
00:56Right, so just to lay this out for you, we'll first be looking at what Slotty thinks the problem with
01:01Salah is,
01:02and then whether or not he's actually right to think that, before finally, will any of the changes he's going
01:08to make regarding Salah fix anything?
01:11So we did Liverpool like a fortnight ago, and talked primarily about the imbalance of the ball and how that
01:17was making them a lot easier to play against.
01:20In particular, we highlighted two goals that were virtually identical.
01:25Against both PSG and Bournemouth, the initial ball that opens Liverpool up is into the space immediately behind Salah,
01:32from which a player is able to stride uncontested into a dangerous position,
01:37before picking out a player who has gotten the wrong side of the full-back.
01:41Now, the reason we used those two goals, because one was from the very first week of the season,
01:46and one was from literally the week we made the video, so it highlighted that this had been going on
01:51for a long time.
01:52But, if the point we'd been trying to make had been about Salah specifically, rather than the system as a
01:58whole,
01:59there were a lot of other things we could have used.
02:02In particular, the winning goal against Chelsea.
02:05It all comes from how Gusto, Caicedo and Lavia get Chelsea out of Liverpool's press so brilliantly,
02:11but to nobody's surprise, they do that by playing the ball immediately into that space between Salah and the full
02:20-back.
02:20So as soon as it's played, he is immediately wrong side.
02:24However, however, however, however, while Salah's game is not about running back to his own goal,
02:29he still does do that, and he recovers quite well against Cucurea to get back goal side of him.
02:35So at the very start of the move, there is this gap between him and the player he's supposed to
02:39be marking,
02:40but he recovers really well and he gets back in here pretty quickly.
02:44And without an ounce of cynicism from me, I think that is good work.
02:49It shows an awareness of what's going on around you, it shows a willingness to work really hard,
02:54even that late in a game, that's fine.
02:56But then, this is where the problem starts.
03:00Cucurea knocks it on, he carries his run forward,
03:03and Salah, clearly having decided he has tracked back enough by this point, just stops.
03:09So now, you've got Salah's man running untracked into the box, providing an overload,
03:15pulling other players around to cover him,
03:16and eventually it is him who gets the ball and assists the goal.
03:21Now do not get me wrong, my dear friends, I am not saying this goal is all Mo Salah's fault,
03:27because if your best attacking player is supposed to be the one stopping chances happening in his own box,
03:34then clearly the fault lies across the system as a whole, not with him individually.
03:39However, the reality is that Salah working back this hard is good,
03:45but then just standing still and watching his team concede a goal is bad.
03:50The facts are simply the facts, and the facts here are that if Mo Salah is not on the pitch,
03:55say, this is Sobber's lie and that's, I don't know, Conor Bradley or somebody,
04:00Liverpool, do not concede that goal and do not lose that game.
04:04Now again, not Mo Salah's fault, in my opinion, but clearly, four on a slot,
04:09the frequency with which you're seeing chances come out of this area of the pitch,
04:14combined with his drop-off in terms of his attacking returns,
04:18mean that his inclusion in this team is a problem.
04:22So the question then is, is that a fair assessment?
04:26Are these isolated incidents actually a fair reflection of his performances as a whole?
04:32Well, if we look at the numbers, they are quite staggering.
04:35Like, looking at Salah's FB ref profiles between this season and last season,
04:40purely for his off-the-ball work, and, yeah, that is a player who does not do any defending,
04:47not doing any defending.
04:48But the difference is, this player here broke the Premier League's all-time goal contributions record,
04:54with 47 goals and assists in just 38 matches.
04:59And this guy here, across a 10-game nightmare run, has two goals and zero assists.
05:06So while these numbers do look very similar, they are, in the wider context, very different.
05:12Or, to put that another way, while they're both clearly bad in terms of an out-of-possession performance,
05:17this set of numbers are not a problem, because they clearly work within a system.
05:23But this set of numbers, in a system that is not working, are catastrophic.
05:28And what is worse, right, is as extremely not-his-game as both these sets of numbers are,
05:34if you really start looking at them, there is still a massive reduction.
05:39Combined tackles and interceptions, or just defensive contribution, as you may prefer to call it,
05:46has dropped 60% this season.
05:50And balls weren't in the final third.
05:51The one thing you really would like Mo Salah to be having a little bit of an impact with,
05:56to help you pressing, has dropped 70%.
06:00So, yes, the argument that, well, he wasn't defending last season either, is absolutely true.
06:06But somehow, this season, he's defending even less, or at least less effectively.
06:12Now, obviously, and I am at pains to keep saying this,
06:15if your fortunes are going to be dictated by Mo Salah's defensive contribution,
06:22then your problem is not Mo Salah, is it?
06:24It's with everything else going on across the pitch.
06:27But, and you knew there was going to be a but,
06:30it is in the areas of his game that you do expect him to make a difference,
06:34that the real problem lies.
06:37Obviously, we know that his goals are down, his assists are down.
06:41That is obvious from watching the games.
06:42But, if you go a little deeper into the numbers, right,
06:46you'll see that his total touches per game, how involved he is in the match,
06:50has remained consistent.
06:51But his touches in the penalty area have plummeted from nearly 10 per match,
06:58to just over 6.
06:59Going to be doing a lot of percentages in this video,
07:02that is nearly a 40% decrease.
07:05His progressive carries aren't down too drastically,
07:08but the number of carries into the penalty area have almost halved.
07:13He is attempting about as many take-ons per 90 minutes as he was last season,
07:18but his success rate has gone from 42%,
07:21which is perfectly average in the Premier League,
07:23to 26%, which is really, really low.
07:27So, what that means for chance creation is that while his number of key passes,
07:32or just any pass that leads to a shot, are pretty consistent,
07:36his expected assists, how good are those chances that said passes are making,
07:41have gone from 0.38 to 0.2.
07:44Again, a drop-off of nearly 50%.
07:46And as for his shooting, the one thing you can always, always rely on Mo Salah for,
07:53his shot volume has plummeted, his shot accuracy has plummeted,
07:58and he's gone from being one of the league's best over-performers,
08:01relative to the quality of his chances,
08:03to just being distinctly, statistically average.
08:06And just to put that in words that make a lot more sense than the numbers,
08:10right, I personally think you can pin his under-performance this season off the ball,
08:16more on the problems Liverpool are having as a team,
08:19than just him as an individual.
08:21Like, this space has always been there, it's always been exploitable,
08:24it's just the price you pay to keep Mo Salah in the right attacking positions.
08:28But these on-the-ball numbers, that is a lot more down to him.
08:33And again, not entirely, I'm going to show you in a second,
08:35while this system is still a problem in the final third,
08:39but Mo Salah for Liverpool has always been more about individual magic
08:44than just a cog in a system.
08:46And this season, he's just stopped having any real, singular impact on games.
08:52I just think, right, for me, whatever else is going on with the football team,
08:57whether it's the personnel or the structure or whatever,
08:59there are a number of things you can be personally accountable for.
09:03And shooting accurately, beating your man, things like that,
09:07they're all down to you.
09:08And Mo Salah is not doing any of that stuff anywhere near as reliably as he was last season.
09:15But as I say, there are circumstances for this.
09:17Last season, almost every single off-the-ball run while he had the thing
09:21was designed to make space for him.
09:23Like, this is from last season.
09:25Sobber's lie here at no stage is really looking to receive this pass.
09:30Once he lays it off, he's just trying to occupy this area in front of the defenders
09:34to ensure Salah's path to a shooting position is as open as possible.
09:39Which, of course, it usually was.
09:41And here he cuts inside, he gets on his left foot, it's a brilliant goal,
09:44it's classic Mo Salah at Liverpool.
09:46Here, again, against Tottenham, the exact same thing.
09:49Sobber's lie has no interest in taking this pass,
09:52but he drags Ben Davies here away from the edge of the box
09:56and bang, again, classic Mo Salah goal.
10:00That is how the rest of the team plays to his strengths.
10:03There's also the other issue of being in counter-attacking situations
10:07and no longer having Trent Alexander-Arnold to find you between the lines
10:11or over the top or things like that.
10:13But one problem at a time, eh?
10:15Now, though, in the final third, Salah gets the ball in this sort of position
10:18on the edge of the box.
10:20And in only three or four games, has this been Dominic Sobber's lie
10:23looking to make a run to help him out?
10:25More often than not, it's Florian Wirtz, who really does want that ball on the edge of the box.
10:31He is looking to receive it.
10:33They haven't spent all that money for him to be making constant, sacrificial runs to open up space.
10:39And even if he does do that, you've now got an Isak or an Eketike who'll go,
10:44oh, space on the edge of the box, and drop into it to receive the ball themselves.
10:48So the space is now hardly ever there.
10:51And even when it is, there's a queue.
10:54There's other players who want to fill it, not just Salah.
10:56And it doesn't just impact what he can do on the ball.
11:00It impacts the decision-making around him as well.
11:03This is just a little moment from the Real Madrid game,
11:06but it just sort of highlights it quite nicely, right?
11:08Liverpool get a counter, Salah isolates the defender,
11:11and last season, every single time, I think, this pass goes straight into him there
11:17so he can square him up and get a chance away.
11:19They've even got the possibility of getting this infield run across to stop any cover getting over.
11:24But instead, that's Hugo Eketike on the ball.
11:28A £70m centre-forward, you sign specifically to try and score goals,
11:34so he tries to score a goal.
11:37So, yeah, things have changed at Liverpool,
11:39as they inevitably will when you have that much upheaval in your squad,
11:43and Mo Salah has not changed with them.
11:47Now, you can, if you want to, argue that Salah is so good and has done so much for Liverpool,
11:52then he shouldn't necessarily be the one having to do the adapting,
11:57but here we are.
11:59Like, these numbers are the facts of the matter this season.
12:03And obviously, it is far too early to assess whether or not binning him off for Salah's line.
12:08That position has made a blind bit of difference to Liverpool as a whole.
12:12But, if you did want to go really granular on the numbers from our official data partners,
12:19FopMob, that's an actual, real-life, long-term, cool thing we're doing.
12:23I'm very pleased about it.
12:24So, go download the app.
12:26Then, yeah, alright, they have been statistically a little bit more solid since making that change.
12:32They've been on a run of conceding, like, 16 chances against Brentford,
12:3613 against City, 15 against Forest, and then half as many against West Ham and Sunderland
12:42before it went back up slightly against Leeds.
12:46And you did, to be fair, see similar sorts of improvements in the XG concedent as well,
12:50if you're particularly bothered about that.
12:52But how much of that is simply just down to the opposition?
12:57West Ham, Sunderland, and Leeds have not been amongst the league's big chance creators this season.
13:01Like, in terms of pure chances, you're playing 18th, 15th, and 9th there.
13:07And I am recording this the day before the Inter game.
13:10Like, it's literally just come out that he's not travelled.
13:12So, we'll see this again and undoubtedly learn a little bit more.
13:16And then after that, you've got Brighton coming up and Tottenham.
13:18So, conclusions to be drawn then, I don't necessarily think now.
13:23So, bottom line then, is Mo Salah in some way to blame for what's happening at Liverpool this season?
13:30Well, I would say no, not really, no more than any other player.
13:37But certainly, the change in system and his individual downturn in performance
13:42tells me he's probably, at this age, much better used as some sort of, like,
13:47high-energy impact sub coming on late in games when it's all stretched and chaotic.
13:52Or, to put that in English, no, it's not really his fault.
13:55But, yeah, he probably shouldn't be an automatic starter.
13:58But, clearly, as evidenced by the fact he spent nearly eight minutes in the mix zone
14:03telling this many people someone doesn't want him at the club,
14:06he does not want to do that.
14:09Either he just feels like he deserves to be playing every single game
14:12or, as he quite heavily implied, when he signed that new contract,
14:16certain assurances were made about this kind of thing
14:19and they're no longer sticking to that.
14:21Either way, it's just really hard to foresee a scenario now
14:25where, come the end of the season, or, God, I don't know,
14:27even maybe come the end of January,
14:30both Slott and Salah are still at this club.
14:34But one thing, right, beyond the tactics and the setup and the systems
14:37and anything like that, right, is if you are a Liverpool fan,
14:42that interview, do you not find that really disappointing?
14:46He hasn't come out during the bad run and said,
14:49yeah, you know, we all need to take responsibility,
14:51I need to up my levels, but we're all working really hard,
14:54we want the fans to stay with us, that kind of thing.
14:56I have no relationship with the manager.
14:59They're throwing me under the bus.
15:01Someone doesn't want me here.
15:03I've done so much for this club.
15:06Like, is that fair enough?
15:09That's Mo Salah, he can say whatever he wants, or just...
15:13Like, with everything, everything Liverpool's been through this year,
15:17do you not just keep that internal, no matter how bad it gets,
15:21and just work a bit harder and see where you end up?
15:24Like, I'm genuinely asking, if you're a Liverpool fan,
15:28where do you stand?
15:29Not on Salah, where do you stand on that interview?
15:32And that is simply all the context I am personally able to provide you
15:37on this matter.
15:38So hopefully now, in your own head, you have answered the question,
15:41are Liverpool better without Mo Salah?
15:45Me? You're asking what do I think?
15:47Well, I think we'll see.
15:50That is the video, though.
15:51I dearly hope you enjoyed it, and thanks, as ever,
15:53to our official data partners at FOTMOB.
15:55I, and every single person I know, has it on our phone,
15:59and not even because I told them to do that, even though I did.
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16:05at the Adam Cleary Football Channel.
16:06The whiff of 200,000 subs is deep in my nostrils.
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16:14And the one target for 2025 that I was given that I have not hit yet
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16:24and you like to use it in Doomscroll, check that out.
16:27And finally, I really should end on this,
16:29since everybody keeps telling me it looks so much like a Liverpool away kit,
16:33the ACFC shirt, proudly made for us by our friends at Kit and Bone.
16:37That is available to you by now at the link in the description
16:39at a thoroughly, thoroughly reasonable for a football kit price.
16:44We made that as cheap as we humanly possibly could,
16:47because it's just cool that people might wear that.
16:50That's it. The Salah thing's very sad.
16:52It's a weird way for him to go out.
16:54I will have more thoughts on this as things change and happen.
16:57And that's it. Bye!
17:02Bye!
17:02Bye!
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