Salah to Liverpool bomb squad the reaction of a ‘not weak’ Arne Slot

Arne Slot insists people shouldn’t take his “calm and polite” demeanour as a sign that he’s “weak”, but a truly strong manager wouldn’t have let Mohamed Salah continue to train with Liverpool given what we now know after the Reds manager’s press conference.

Salah came out swinging (his toys from the pram) after he was an unused substitute in the 3-3 draw with Leeds on Saturday, the third Premier League game on the bounce the Liverpool legend hasn’t started and the second in that run he has seen no minutes off the bench.

READ MORE: Mo Salah is a great big baby tantrumming from a position on the floor

He claimed he had been “thrown under the bus” and that he now doesn’t have a “relationship” with Slot having played a starring role last season as the Dutch boss led Liverpool to the Premier League title at the first time of asking.

Salah whined from the weakest position he’s found himself in at Anfield. He’s been roundly criticised for his ineffective and costly displays for the Reds, not producing in attacking areas and either refusing or failing to help out his right-back in defence.

Slot said in his press conference ahead of their Champions League clash with Inter that he had made his feelings on Salah’s comments “clear” by dropping him from their travelling 19-man squad. He and his Liverpool bosses evidently aren’t happy.

“I have no clue,” Slot said when asked whether Salah has played his last game for the club. To bystanders it feels like there’s little hope of a way back.

Asked if Slot has asked Salah what he meant when he said he had been “thrown under the bus”, Slot replied: “No. Not with those words. Usually I’m calm and polite but that doesn’t mean I’m weak.

“If a player has these comments about so many things then it is up to me, us, as a club, to react and you can see now that he’s not here.”

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Dropping him from the squad is the minimum reaction. And we would contend with Slot’s assertion that it’s a sign of strength, and instead question why Salah has been allowed to train with his teammates – presumably discussing with them what he said after the Leeds game – without being confronted directly by Slot and some Liverpool higher-ups.

What Salah did was unacceptable. We know it. He knows it. Slot knows it. And – most importantly – his teammates know it. And yet, Salah was seen beaming what looked like very conscious smiles with the cameras focused on him in training as if it was any other day.

Surely the first port of call would be to find out exactly what he meant. And if his answer wasn’t satisfactory then jettison him to a bomb squad of one.

Slot can’t just say he’s not “weak”, he needs to prove it, by making an example of a guy who may claim he’s been “thrown under the bus” but is in fact the one putting his manager and club under the wheels of a double-decker.