MEZIESBLOG

Top of the Premier League, top of the Champions League, and feeling top of the world through what was being billed as an uncertain, unsexy post-Klopp era, Liverpool have consistently proven they get the big decisions right.

Their sustainable, noise-cancelling approach has been successful and there is confidence in the fortified operational structure of the club, overseen by Michael Edwards.

Liverpool’s job is not to give a player whatever he wants but to use a wide lens and assess all repercussions of a single decision. They are in no doubt about what Salah is capable of, what he is worth, and how much he means to the club beyond performances and sentiment.

Players like him have earned a tweaking of the parameters, but not at the expense of future squad planning, keeping the age profile of the team healthy, and natural evolution.

Even if they keep Salah and Van Dijk, which is the win all parties are after, Liverpool will have to replace them in the not-so-distant future.

They cannot ignore that reality in their calculations. There will be the weighing up of what to throw at Alexander-Arnold – chiefly the kitchen sink – for him to delay the desire to join Real, sign an extension, and fetch a head-spinning sum if he does leave for Madrid as he’ll represent pure profit on the books.

Allowing the 26-year-old academy graduate to exit for free this summer is a worse trading look than shaking hands with Salah and Van Dijk, giving them a rousing send-off, and wishing them well.

There are multiple sizeable equations at play.

Rightly or wrongly, if Liverpool survey the European landscape, they might take heart that there is no obvious fit for Salah. He wants to be competing for top honours and remain centre stage so which of the best clubs have an opening for him and can assume the cost of a meaty signing-on fee and the wages he is worth?

Salah is very mindful of how his strengths would fit stylistically as well. “I can’t tell Mohamed that, say, he will fit better in Ancelotti’s system, or is going to do much better with Guardiola,” Abbas explained. “Many other agents do that, but I do not. Mohamed knows his football.”

The adulation Salah receives from the Kop – as was the case after his missed penalty – will not be replicated anywhere else. His endorsements have been partly a result of the club he plays for, the foundations they’ve created for him to thrive, and the emotional connection that can be commercially mined.

Liverpool will need to make some concessions, but so too must Salah.

How did we get here?

The frustration for a large swathe of Liverpool supporters is wrapping their heads around how the club – with a well-earned reputation of being run smartly – have backed themselves into such a tight corner where three of their spine can exit at the same time.

The answer is layered; affixed to structural changes, a shifting of power, a season of Europa League football, needing an urgent midfield rebuild, Klopp’s shock decision to step away, and judging the assimilation under Arne Slot.

Sporting director Richard Hughes has inherited a shambolic situation completely not of his making, and he has to crack the conundrum.

Everything stretches back to spell in 2022, starting with the departure of the man who filled that role before Hughes and headhunted him – Edwards, now CEO of football for owners Fenway Sports Group.

Julian Ward, his replacement as sporting director, announced he was also leaving after just a few months in the position. Mike Gordon, FSG president and head of the day-to-day running of Liverpool, had stepped back from his responsibilities.

Along with Edwards, he was instrumental in ensuring the club were world-class off the pitch and putting the pieces in place – including the coup of landing Klopp – to mirror that where it mattered most.

In the absence of the pair, suddenly the manager was all-powerful on account of the glory he had delivered and while no one could ever begrudge him such status, the admin of recruitment and contract renewals isn’t his strong point.

There were more pressing issues like refitting a midfield that was starved of dynamism, steel and variety. Europa League football is not the platform to seduce players to commit to the club so getting back to the top table was paramount.

Liverpool steered themselves back into healthy, happy territory but then came the jolt of Klopp’s goodbye.

When the German told FSG last November that he would be calling time on his intoxicating Anfield tenure in the summer, the hierarchy could have pulled a fast move to tie Salah, Virgil and Alexander-Arnold down before they knew he was leaving. That is not the way they like to do business.

“The club have known about my departure for a while,” Klopp explained in January. “Tying the players down and then me saying ‘I won’t be here anymore’, they’d be like ‘no one told us that’, you can’t work like this, especially with the relationship we have.

“There’s enough time to do everything. These players love to be here. I know that for a fact.”

That remains true. There had been a desire from both sides – Liverpool and the trio – to understand what Arne Slot’s football would look and feel like, and how it would translate to them. To that end, talks over new deals are understood to have commenced in October.

Liverpool remain calm over the situation. Salah can’t be blamed for feeling otherwise.