Liverpool coach Juergen Klopp said that the suffering of his striker Mohamed Salah in front of the goal is due to the team not having three well-coordinated strikers who terrorized the opponents’ defenses in the past.
Although the Egyptian striker scored 17 goals in all competitions at the end of half of this season, he scored only seven goals in the English Premier League, as his average goals were about 24 goals per season during his time with Liverpool.
Salah was crowned top scorer three times, but he moved away from his best levels after the departure of his attacking partner Sadio Mane last summer and the injury of Roberto Firmino, Diogo Jota and Luis Diaz.
Klopp told reporters: Of course, Salah suffers. There was a good machine in attack, everything was clear in what we were doing. Everyone suffers from it and it shows. It is a specific offensive game that requires a lot of work and information, and not always clear information. You make a feeling about a lot of these things, about where your team mate is and how you pass the ball to him without looking.
Mane moved to Bayern Munich at the end of last season, while Jota, Firmino and Diaz have not played since last year’s World Cup in Qatar, and Liverpool dropped to ninth in the league standings.
Liverpool strengthened its attack by contracting Dutchman Cody Jakobo during the transfer period, but he is still adapting to the team, while Darwin Nunez’s performance has not been consistent, scoring only one goal in the FA Cup since the season resumed last month.
Klopp added: In two or three weeks, two more options will be available and we can mix strikers. When Darwin plays, he moves forward and then back. We’ve never played an outspoken striker before. Even when Sadio played in this position, he would fall back in moments. This is not Darwin’s way. He wants to have the ball at his feet.