Mohamed Salah will leave Liverpool as one of the greatest players ever to represent the club and to grace the Premier League.
Salah’s statistics deliver the evidence – but so much more lies beneath the numbers for the iconic Anfield figure labelled the ‘Egyptian King’ by his adoring followers on the Kop.
He arrived at Liverpool from AS Roma on 23 June 2017 for £34m, a fee now resembling an act of grand larceny when set against what he subsequently achieved.
Salah, like another eventual Premier League great Kevin de Bruyne, had been at Chelsea but failed to make an impact, scoring two goals in 19 appearances, with only 10 starts.
He turned down Liverpool to join Chelsea when leaving Swiss side Basel in January 2014 – his only Anfield memory before he eventually arrived on Merseyside being a start for Jose Mourinho’s side in a 2-0 win there in the following April. It was an encounter infamous for Steven Gerrard’s slip and a result that pushed the title towards Manchester City.
Since then, however, Salah has provided memories to last a lifetime for Liverpool and their global fanbase as he has helped add the Champions League, two Premier League titles, the FA Cup, EFL Cup, Uefa Super Cup and Fifa Club World Cup to Anfield’s honours board.
Salah’s career started as something of a slow burner at Basel, with coach Murat Yakin hinting at what he could become after he scored in their 2013 Europa League quarter-final win against Tottenham.
Yakin said: “If Mohamed could score as well, he would not be here any more.”
He did. And he was not.
Salah progressed at such a rapid rate after leaving Chelsea, first on loan at Fiorentina then a superb spell at AS Roma, that by the time he arrived at Anfield he was the finished article – but it is unlikely that even Jurgen Klopp realised what a talent he had signed.
The first goal Salah scored was a scruffy, bundled effort from on the goalline in a 3-3 draw at Watford on the opening day of his first season. From then on he never stopped scoring.
As he prepares to take his leave, Salah has scored 255 goals in 435 games for Liverpool. This puts him third on the club’s all-time list of scorers, behind Ian Rush and Roger Hunt.