Mohamed Salah could be handed major Liverpool responsibility to sweeten new deal – Paul Gorst

The character of Gini Wijnaldum’s Liverpool exit was a tricky one to take for supporters.

A agency fan favorite during the last 5 years, that such a trusted midfielder was allowed to stroll off into the sundown as a free agent will rankle with many for a while.

Particularly contemplating that the player himself was desperate to stay and Jurgen Klopp was so eager to retain his companies.

This can be a not a participant whose finest days are behind him and the subsequent transfer is downwards.

No, Wijnaldum will solely add extra high quality to a Champions League-challenging PSG squad that’s already bursting with it.

Sometimes, Klopp struck a poetic tone in his ultimate goodbye message to the Netherlands worldwide on Thursday.

“Farewell, Gini: you got here, you noticed, you received the lot. You’re a Liverpool legend now and perpetually.”

Brilliantly put.

However the debate over why a participant who featured 51 occasions final season was waved off with seemingly little opposition will rage on, for now.

Wijnaldum’s departure, nonetheless, will at the very least see alternative knock for an additional member of the Liverpool squad.

All through a lot of the final three years, Wijnaldum has shaped one quarter of Klopp’s on-field management committee.

Alongside skipper Jordan Henderson, vice-captain James Milner and Netherlands chief Virgil van Dijk, Wijnaldum is a key a part of a four-man group that bridges the hole between gamers and administration.

When the staff took the decision to send a message within the wake of the George Floyd killing final 12 months, it was the 4 captains who introduced the concept to the remainder of their colleagues earlier than informing Klopp of their plan.

“The captains have all the time come collectively to verify the gamers’ views are represented,” says one Anfield supply of the group.

With Wijnaldum now out of the image, nonetheless, Klopp will probably be tasked with discovering one other to take his place.

Trent Alexander-Arnold, together with his boyhood connections and unashamed dream to sooner or later skipper Liverpool, could possibly be prepared for the subsequent massive step in his Anfield growth.

“Trent might be an unbelievable captain for the membership, I actually consider that, he’s nonetheless younger and has quite a bit to develop,” former Reds defender Jose Enrique told the ECHO this week.

So too may Alisson Becker, whose quiet and calm opinion carries weight contained in the Anfield dressing room.

Scotland skipper Andy Robertson is one other who instructions the respect of your complete enjoying employees on the membership.

But when Klopp is searching for a participant who would most relish the chance to develop additional right into a Liverpool chief, he want look no additional than Mohamed Salah.

To some, the captain’s armband is neither needed nor wanted; a prop of yesteryear’s soccer ideology.

To others, nonetheless, it empowers.

One solely has to have a look at how present captain Henderson has blossomed on and off the pitch since assuming the mantle from the legendary Steven Gerrard in 2015.

Salah is somebody who counts himself in that latter bracket; the obligations of the captain matter to him.

A lot in order that he wears it for his nationwide facet with considerable pleasure because the poster-boy for soccer in Egypt.

“Actually, I used to be very upset,” Salah admitted after Alexander-Arnold was given the responsibility forward of him for a Champions League dead-rubber in Midtjylland again in December.

“I hoped to be the captain, however it’s a coach’s determination. I settle for it.”

Klopp later confessed the oversight was his mistake, saying that because the longest-serving participant on the pitch in Denmark that evening, Divock Origi ought to the truth is have led the facet out.

“The rule right here is, we now have a gamers’ committee,” stated Klopp. “Hendo wears the armband, and if he’s not enjoying then it’s Milly.

“If these two aren’t enjoying then it’s Virgil and if all three aren’t enjoying, it’s Gini. If all of them can’t play, then it’s often the participant who’s longest on the membership.

“Someone afterwards advised me it could have been Divock Origi, however Div was on mortgage and stuff like that.

“That was my fault. I didn’t make it that difficult. It was simply: ‘Trent is longest on the membership, so he has the armband’.

“After all, I spoke to Mo about it afterwards. Once I realised it didn’t work out that nicely [for him], I clarified it, after which he spoke about it once more within the interview, which isn’t an issue for me.

“Sure, he was upset, however I didn’t do it on goal. I simply did what I did, and if I made a mistake then it was that Divock Origi was not the captain that day.”

Given Salah’s shock response to being missed for an in any other case meaningless Champions League fixture, it could not require a leap of religion to recommend he could be delighted to turn into one among Klopp’s quartet of captains.

At a time when the membership are hoping to open contract talks for final season’s 31-goal high scorer, a promotion into the interior circle could be a further gesture to indicate simply how a lot he’s valued at Anfield.