"In that frozen moment, everything was still possible. The game was scoreless. Nobody was hurt. After one of the great goal-scoring campaigns in football history, Salah was still the object of wildest imaginations, a possible winner of the Ballon d'Or. The weight he carried was that of the most optimistic projections. There was only hope.
If Liverpool could have sold him in that instant, they should have. That was Salah, the stock, at peak value. He will never be worth more than he was worth then.
Liverpool should still sell him. His value might be less than it was 24 minutes and 40 seconds into the Champions League final, but it will only continue to drop. Liverpool should sell Mohamed Salah as soon as they can." - Chris Jones, ESPN
Shake my god damn head.
With the World Cup raging on I was so content and at peace without hearing any crazy transfer news or rumors but to my surprise it wasn’t the usual suspects The Guardian, The Mirror, or The Sun. It turned out to be…ESPN? Yes! ESPN dropping a doozy of a hot take saying that Liverpool FC should sell star player Mohammed Salah…okay deep breathe*
Let’s start out and say the European view and especially English view of American soccer knowledge is not great. We are mostly seen as some bumbling rednecks crashing heads and drinking outrageous amounts of alcohol which is ya know, I’m fine with. What I’m not fine with is tarnishing us even more with this garbage take made by this guy at ESPN, who’s already been petitioned to be fired for his Portugal Euros 2016 take lolol. Also he’s Canadian so Sorrey for what I’m about to say.
Essentially the argument is that Salah has peaked. Salah will never have another individual season as he did, and it’s probably downhill from here and from a business standpoint it’d be a financially sound decision. I can understand the argument, don’t get me wrong. For Liverpool the business it’s a no brainer and a real softball deal to be done. For Liverpool, the competitive sports club, it would be the biggest bonehead move of all time and would probably cause every sports club across Europe to lose respect for them.
Before we get to Salah let’s talk about peaking. As someone who peaked in college and is on a slow downhill to skinny-fat and then eventually dadbod it’s great time to remind myself of what peak was. This girl actually texted me what was my happiest moment and like a true romantic I responded with the cheesy answer “meeting you” and then began to continuously punch myself in the face for how corny and self-embarrassing I can be. I really responded with my time studying abroad and waking up on this Mediterranean cruise with my friends in different countries every morning and not knowing where we were and drinking like a god damn fish every night. Ugh that was peaaaaak. Anyway. Let’s talk about Salah’s peak.
If I had a peak season like Salah this year I would have retired IMMEDIATELY following the World Cup. I would have taken whatever money left, bought a nice couch, and sat in front of the TV watching soccer pundits wonder what could have been. Could he have overtaken Messi and Ronaldo as the best player in the world? What was his ceiling? Ya know other nonsensical sports debates. Then again I only played club soccer in college and never knew what it was like to be good at sports so can’t say what I’d really do in his situation.
Salah had one of the greatest individual seasons I have ever witnessed. When he was picked up by Liverpool from Roma for a measly €42 million it was first seen as a bad buy. A player who was regarded as, ya know, good, but not world class. He would go on to shut the haters down by amassing over 30 individual awards, breaking the all-time goal scoring record in the premier league in a single season, and carrying not only his team to a Champions League Final but helping his national side qualify for the World Cup. The haters will say that yes he was swept out of both the UCL final and World Cup but I mean are we that surprised with the talent surrounding him on both sides and who he was up against. I mean its scary seeing someone else besides Messi and Ronaldo score over 40 goals in a season plus someone who has seemingly appeared out of nowhere.
This guy from ESPN is out of his gourd if he thinks Liverpool could find anyone close on the open market would come to their club after selling Salah. Selling Salah would show players wanting to come to the club that they’re not about winning but more about business. As a player I would be severely disheartened to go to a club who would be more about the money than winning. If Salah even delivered 80% of his outstanding performance from the 17/18 season it would be considered an incredible sustained success.
If Liverpool are serious about winning and I even have them in my top 1 or 2 to win the Premier League next year if they can find a few more key pieces and replace others, you know who I’m talking about, then they keep Salah no doubt. So expect this quack of a reporter’s resignation for this blasphemous claim in 3…2…1….
- Kevin Pettit