The one-season wonder is breaking records well into his sixth campaign with Liverpool. Salah grabbed a hat-trick of assists for the Reds in the 3-0 win over Leicester City on Monday night and this haul now means he’s been involved in 10+ goals and 10+ assists across four seasons since the move to Merseyside.
If he scores one goal in either of the two remaining matches for Jurgen Klopp’s side, against Aston Villa or Southampton, he becomes the first player in Premier League history to manage 20+ goals and 10+ assists in three seasons. Right now, he’s tied with Thierry Henry having achieved this feat on two occasions.
The 30-year-old penned a new deal in the summer and some had doubts over whether this was the smart move. The Reds rewarded Salah for his performances over the years with a club-record salary that keeps him at Anfield until 2025.
By his standards, he did start off a little slow.
Salah scored just three goals in the opening 10 Premier League appearances of the 2022/23 campaign. He did chip in with three assists but the Egypt international tends to start off hot and when he didn’t, people noticed. In all five seasons prior to this one, the No.11 had a minimum of five goal involvements in his first six appearances. He wasn’t able to extend this streak to six.
As the Premier League paused for the World Cup, the three-time Golden Boot winner had just seven goals in the English top flight. It was a team issue rather than a Salah one but it is worth noting that he was near the top of the Big Chances Missed table, along with teammate Darwin Nunez.
Earlier in the campaign, he was tasked with creating in the new Liverpool system. After a while, Klopp changed it to get Salah back into central areas but it was changing on an almost weekly basis. The Reds used 4-4-2, a diamond shape and even returned to a false-nine system in the search for solidity. There were a few false dawns with a couple of positive results but, ultimately, the balance was off and easier to exploit.
However, with Liverpool finally landing on something of a more settled system in 2023, following the January arrival of Cody Gakpo, Salah has found his goalscoring groove once again. He’s netted 13 goals in the Premier League post-World Cup. He recently broke another record for the Reds having scored in nine successive games at Anfield.
The former Roma man has eight goals and three assists in his last 10 outings in the English top tier and this coincides with Klopp’s men climbing up the table. At the end of March, a push for the top four looked unlikely. With two games to play, the Reds are primed to displace one of Newcastle United or Manchester United if either team slip up.
In April, Salah claimed another Premier League record. He surpassed Robbie Fowler’s total of 105 left-footed goals in the 6-1 win over Leeds United. The No.11 is just a relentless goal machine.
Liverpool are unbeaten in nine and have won their last seven with Salah scoring the winner in three of these matches – Nottingham Forest, Fulham and Brentford.
Only three players (Erling Haaland, Harry Kane and Ivan Toney) have more goals than the one-time Basel man and only two players (Kevin De Bruyne and Bukayo Saka) have registered more assists.
The fact the Liverpool forward is the only player to appear in the top five for both goals and assists in what was considered by many to be a down year highlights just how productive he is.
Even if he blanks in the remaining two matches and doesn’t break the existing record, this has been yet another successful campaign for the attacker. He continues to post unique numbers on a regular basis and is one of the all-time greats in Premier League history. Not bad for a one-season wonder.
