Why Salah has become a defensive liability for Liverpool

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If the 4-1 home defeat to PSV in the Champions League was the moment that Arne Slot decided enough was enough and Mohamed Salah had to be dropped, the turning point might have been the much narrower loss to Chelsea at Stamford Bridge in October.

Marc Cucurella’s on-pitch explanation for Chelsea’s winner that day highlighted the weakness that teams have been trying to exploit against Liverpool. The full-back was allowed to move forward into the box untracked to lay on the goal for Estevao.

“We know that Salah is already ready to attack, to play on the counter-attack, so we know, and we practise, and the manager tells us, that the space is maybe there,” he told Sky Sports, before adding: “Today it worked and we can win the game in this way.”

In each of the next four Premier League defeats that Liverpool have suffered, the opposition have focused their attacks down the left wing – Liverpool’s right. When Jamie Carragher talks of Salah throwing his right-back under the bus, this is what he means.

Salah’s defending has never been his biggest strength. Jurgen Klopp often used Jordan Henderson to ensure Liverpool’s structure was sound on that side of the pitch. But the statistics show that Salah’s own defensive work declined dramatically after Klopp’s exit.

Under Slot, this was the trade off, the deal that Salah alluded to having made with his coach in firing Liverpool to the title last season. The Egyptian eschewed his defensive duties but repaid for that privilege by delivering the goals and assists at the other end.

“Now I don’t have to defend much. It is quite difficult to say one thing, but the tactics are quite different. But I told him, ‘As long as you rest me defensively, I will provide offensively’ – so I’m glad I did. It was the manager’s idea, of course, but he listens a lot.”

Salah might talk of broken promises but perhaps Slot believes that it is the player who failed to hold up his end of the bargain. Six non-penalty goals in his last 33 appearances for Liverpool tells the tale. Salah’s output is no longer justifying the problems he causes.

Against PSV, all it took was a mere drop of the shoulder from Mauro Junior for him to skip away from Salah and set up the goal that restored the Dutch side’s lead at Anfield. “Salah was embarrassing in terms of the challenge he puts it,” said Carragher.

The gap that the PSV player was able to open up by the time that he provided the assist was alarming and highlighted Salah’s unwillingness to track back. The statistics also reveal this decline, his defensive work for Liverpool steadily declining year on year.

To an extent, that is unavoidable. Salah’s physical decline in his 34th year is an inevitability. It is there in his attacking numbers too. His overall sprints are down and so are his top speeds. Perhaps he is no longer able to put in that shift even if he wanted to.

But it helps to explain why, in a desperate bid to regain some defensive control, Slot elected to drop a player who has become a defensive liability. Salah’s poor contribution is further illustrated by how rarely he tracks back into position for Liverpool.

This metric measures the number of times that a player runs back into their own half to regain their defensive position. Of the 45 wide forwards to play 270 minutes or more in the Premier League so far this season, Salah makes that run less than anyone else.

In this context, Slot’s decision appears logical in an attempt to tighten up. “What are you going to do as a manager? You are going to take out the one player in your team who you have allowed not to defend,” said Carragher of Slot’s team selection at West Ham.

It also explains why Salah remained an unused substitute in that 2-0 win at the London Stadium and more recently in the away game at Leeds when Liverpool were defending a lead. “Why would you bring him on? You don’t need a goal, you need not to concede.”

Statistically, it is possible to compare Liverpool’s defensive intensity with and without Salah – and the evidence is compelling. By isolating zones of the pitch, it is possible to establish how often Liverpool press the opposition when they have the ball there.

On Liverpool’s right side, when they are in their defensive third, they become much more intense in their pressing when Salah is not on the pitch. The clear weakness that Cucurella pointed out – and every team since then has targeted – becomes less apparent.

Of course, it did not stop Leeds finding a stoppage-time equaliser. There are other problems for Slot to address at Liverpool and his failure to do so emboldened Salah to make his incendiary remarks in the belief that the coach’s position was weakened.

But the analysis shows that unless Salah is again able to register the attacking numbers that have made him a Liverpool legend, the fact that he has become a defensive liability is harming his hopes of being trusted again almost as much as his outspoken comments.

This news was originally published on this post .

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