Mohamed Salah says he doesn’t know whether he’ll be able to agree a new contract at Liverpool, stressing that the negotiations are not just about money but claims he thinks that he will be playing at Anfield next season.
The Egyptian’s contract expires in the summer of 2023 and the saga over a new one has been going on for some time now.
The 29-year-old has been incredible for the Reds since joining from Roma in 2017 and is the club’s top scorer in that timeframe. The forward is enjoying another incredible campaign this season, scoring 30 goals and 12 assists in 42 games for the Merseyside club.
The Liverpool forward has been speaking about his current situation to FourFourTwo and revealed some of his thoughts.
When speaking about remaining at Anfield in the future, Salah told FFT: “I don’t know, I have one year left. I think the fans know what I want, but in the contract it’s not everything about the money at all. So I don’t know, I can’t tell you exactly. I have one year left and the fans know what I want.”
“This club means a lot to me – I’ve enjoyed my football here more than anywhere, I gave the club everything and everybody saw that. I’ve had a lot of unbelievable moments here, winning trophies, individual goals, individual trophies. It’s like a family here.”
“Yeah. Er, I think so?” was Salah’s response when asked if he’d be at the club next season, but continued by saying: “But if they want me to go, that’s something different!”
The Liverpool forward says he is “not worried” about going into his final 12 months at the club without knowing his future but Liverpool fans can rest assured that their top scorer will be at the club next season, which allows for more time to negotiate a deal.
That’s unless the club’s owners FSG want to cash in on the Egyptian this summer, but it would be hard to see the club push him out the door, as it wouldn’t go down well with the fans; so the options seem to be, either sign a new deal or lose the player for free next year.
This is yet another chapter in this saga, as Salah’s claims of “it’s not everything about the money” and “the fans know what I want” are quite confusing. It was speculated that the difficulties were down to money and that’s what most fans would have thought too, so what does he mean by this?
Only time will tell but what is certain, is that this whole story still has a few more chapters to be written.
The fans have always given him unwavering adulation, and supported him through lean spells, and even when it seems he’s let his disappointments concerning his national team seemingly effect his club performance.
He needs to understand he’s not the only one on the payroll and we don’t have the sort of funds Chelsea and Man City have to pay the wage levels they do to certain individuals.
He will once again be the highest paid player at the club whatever the club has offered him, but if he expects nearly double what his second highest paid team mate earns then he needs to think again.