Liverpool must return to heavy metal football - Salah
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Mohamed Salah says Liverpool must return to being a "heavy metal attacking team that opponents fear" after "crumbling" to a defeat at Aston Villa which left their Champions League hopes in the balance.Egypt forward Salah, 33, will leave Liverpool at the end of the season after helping the club to six major trophies in nine years at the club, including two Premier League titles and the Champions League.But, before his final match at the club, the Reds are not yet assured of a top-five finish which would guarantee a place in Europe's elite club competition next season at the end of a trophyless campaign.In calling for a return to the high-octane approach of former manager Jurgen Klopp, Salah appeared to criticise head coach Arne Slot by saying their identity under the German, who left in 2024, must be "recovered and kept for good".Salah, who has scored 257 goals for Liverpool, said a return to their former way of playing "cannot be negotiable".Dutchman Slot said this week that he has "every reason to believe" he will remain in charge at Anfield despite a disappointing season, and the club's hierarchy have not indicated that they are considering replacing him this summer.But fan discontent only continued to grow after the 4-2 loss to Aston Villa on Friday night - their 19th defeat of the season - with many supporters in the away end leaving before full-time at Villa Park."I have witnessed this club go from doubters to believers, and from believers to champions. It took hard work and I always did everything I could to help the club get there.
All teams win games," Salah said."Liverpool will always be a club that means a great deal to me and to my family. I want to see it succeed for long after I have moved on."As I've always said, qualifying to next season's Champions League is the bare minimum and I will do everything I can to make that happen."Below Salah's post, Liverpool team-mates Curtis Jones and Hugo Ekitike commented with applauding and handshake emojis respectively.Reds defender Andrew Robertson, who will also leave the club this summer, wrote similarly on Instagram: "A performance which sums up our season.
A long way short of the levels of this club and what you rightly expect of us."On a personal note, he added: "But I can only thank you for the last nine years of travelling up and down the country and all over the world packing out away ends wherever we go! Speaking about supporter frustration after Friday's defeat, he said: "I think then they are underestimating what a window can do, what a new start can do, and I think we know quite well what to improve."I think one of the things we have to improve is also very, very, very obvious, and I would have preferred not to talk about it here, but you're actually almost forcing me to."If you miss nine players that can start a game of football, and almost all of them are starters for us or have been for large part of the season, then if you add that to what you can improve in a window and add that to players that are playing for the second season in the Premier League, that will automatically lead to much more."