Liverpool: Slot told to dump two Klopp favourites with ‘wear and tear starting to show’
Arne Slot has been urged to sell Mohamed Salah and Virgil van Dijk
Arne Slot has been told to “replace” Mohamed Salah and Virgil van Dijk when he takes over at Liverpool at the end of the season.
The Reds have finally chosen their successor to Jurgen Klopp with widespread reports indicating that Feyenoord boss Slot will replace the German in the summer.
Klopp announced earlier this year that he will be stepping down from his role at Anfield at the end of the season to take a break from football.
Slot will have his work cut out to be anywhere near as successful at Anfield as Klopp with the former Borussia Dortmund manager overseeing nine years of progress.
There have been rumours that a number of Klopp’s players could follow him out of Anfield in the summer with speculation over Van Dijk, Salah and Trent Alexander-Arnold, who all enter the final year of their contract in the summer.
And former Netherlands international Rene van der Gijp reckons Slot should make it one of his first jobs to move on Liverpool captain Van Dijk and top goalscorer Salah.
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“I think Slot would do best to slowly replace guys like Salah and Van Dijk,” Van der Gijp told Today Inside.
“I read that Dortmund would be interested in Van Dijk, instead of Hummels. Then you play in a slightly easier competition.
“Salah should also just leave. He has performed incredibly, year in, year out. Now the wear and tear is slowly starting to show. That’s not easy. Your ego is affected, you fall down in the pecking order.”
Van Dijk was linked with a move to Bundesliga side Borussia Dortmund on Monday, while Salah could be the subject of a fresh bid from Saudi Arabia in the summer after Al-Ittihad had a £150m offer rejected just under a year ago.
Gary Neville: It’s too quick to say this is the end of Mo Salah
Salah has scored just two goals in his last eight matches in all competitions but former Manchester United defender Gary Neville insists it is “too quick to say this is the end of Mo Salah”.
Neville told Sky Sports: “Mo Salah has just hit a brick wall, and again, have got to be careful here.
“There is a player out here called Son (Son Heung-min) that I think hit a brick wall about 18 months ago, was it, or so where he looked like he was gone, he was struggling.
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“These players play so much football, they play so consistently. Salah has been almost ever-present for, like, six, seven years, it feels like.
“There just comes a point whereby they just need a break. That’s all I am seeing. It is too quick to say this is the end of Mo Salah because I think we have done that before.
“He just looks like he has just run marathon after marathon after marathon after marathon in every season, and it has got to a point where mentality and physical it has got to a point where he probably thinks, ‘it hit me’, and you don’t even know it sometimes.
“The season end is around the corner, he will get a break and he needs that break.”
More: Liverpool | Arne Slot | Mo Salah