Mohamed Salah has revealed he set himself a target of 40 goals and 15 assists before the current season got underway.
The Egyptian was unable to get on the scoresheet during Liverpool's 3-2 win over Villarreal on Tuesday evening, though won't have been too concerned as Jurgen Klopp's side booked their place in the final of the Champions League. Manchester City or Real Madrid now await in Paris at the end of the month.
Salah scored in all but one of the Reds' Champions League group stage matches this term and was also on target in the Round of 16 first leg away to Inter Milan. The 29-year-old failed to find the back of the net in either leg against last night's opponents, though provided an assist both home and away.
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His contribution in Spain yesterday evening has taken Salah's season tally in all competitions to 30 goals and 15 assists, leaving the prolific forward ten strikes shy of his pre-planned goal. Asked by BT Sport if he usually sits down to plan out his ideal campaign, he responded: "Always. Before the season starts, I know what I want individually and collectively.
"I have big expectations for myself. Honestly, I never said this before but before the season I said ‘Okay, I will go for 40 goals this season and 10, 15 assists’. Now I’ve reached the assists I need to focus on the goals now! I think now Trent is going to be angry because I have the most assists in the Premier League but I will go for everything. Top assists is not something really big, top-scorer is always something really big. Today, when I gave the ball to Fab it changed everything. Assists count for sure, goals as well."
On Liverpool's chances of the completing the unprecedented quadruple, Salah added: "The team is doing unbelievable so let’s hope for the best. For sure [on quadruple being the target], for sure. Maybe not in the beginning of the season, I always focus on Champions League and Premier League, but now we are close for everything so why not?
"After we beat City in the semi-finals of the FA Cup," said the Reds' No.11 when he started to believe it was possible. "But even in the Champions League group stage we played amazing. We had a tough group and played amazing. I started to think we were going to win the Champions League since then."
