Jurgen Klopp passionately believes Mo Salah deserves now to be ranked amongst football’s true goalscoring legends.
The Liverpool forward stands just a goal away from equalling Anfield hero Robbie Fowler’s all-time tally of 183 goals for the club…and moving to sixth place in the all time Reds list of legendary strikers. Salah this week already overtook Fowler as the Premier League ’s all time top scorer of left foot goals, his first strike at Leeds taking him to 106, ahead of the England striker and Robin van Persie.
And Klopp said: “Last week when I heard he had the most left-footed goals in Premier League history, I have to say, that’s insane. When you see the names below, Fowler, Van Persie, Giggs, players like this, Premier League greats, absolutely. That’s massive.”
Passing Fowler will be another huge landmark in Liverpool’s history, with the local born striker widely regarded as the most natural finisher in the club’s history.
And he will do it in far fewer games too, with a goals-per-game ratio of 0.61 which is second only to between the wars striker Gordon Hodgson (0.63) on the all time list, and ahead of Fowler, Ian Rush and Roger Hunt.
For Klopp, that deserves a special place in the club’s history. “In life, as long as you are together you appreciate some things maybe not as much as you should. We do.
“Saying that, surpassing Robbie in another stat, I know that Mo likes these kind of things and will fill his tank, definitely, for the game.
“But he knows assists are important as well, so he doesn’t forget it’s important or really nice to break a record but much more important that we win the game.”
Meanwhile, Klopp has stressed Trent Alexander-Arnold's impressive performance in a new advanced, hybrid role is not the solution to all their problems this season.
Klopp said the tactic of the right-back stepping into a central midfield role when the team are in possession was not "set in stone" but early indications against Arsenal and Leeds suggest it could become a viable long-term option.
"This slightly advanced role suits him in the moment really well," said Klopp, who revealed he had only a week to work on the position with the defender, ahead of the visit of Nottingham Forest.
"It's a challenge for everyone else to cover the spaces when we lose the ball theoretically but with him there we didn't lose that many balls, which was helpful as well.
"Trent is a smart player and that he can play the position was never in doubt but you have to set it up around him because there are moments when we lose the ball we have a different formation - where's Robbo (Andy Robertson), where's Virgil (Van Dijk) and Ibou (Ibrahima Konate)?
"How do we get him on the ball, because that is obviously important. We sit here and talk about it and whether we do it like this or not tomorrow we will see but if Trent shows up there maybe he gets a man-marker, that's possible, and if he doesn't get the ball then we have to deal with that.
"It is now not the solution for all the football problems we had this year but he has potential to play that position. But it's not written in stone, why should we? We will see where it leads to."
