Salah not left ‘spinning’ as Ern Slott wrong Liverpool idea for Frankfurt

Arne Slott was concerned about what might be written and said about his team “rotating” for their Champions League clash with Frankfurt on Wednesday, but Egyptian Salah’s absence from the starting line-up following his display against Manchester United is a matter of resting the Egyptian’s 33-year-old legs.

“‘Spin’ always comes off as, ‘Oh, let somebody else play a little bit,'” Slott said.

“But I said many times, we have a lot of good players and I can use them all. If you play three games in seven days, it’s probably smart to use them all. That’s why we were 1-0 down, but because we need to use the squad, we made three substitutions after 55 minutes against United.

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“We’ll use a lot of players again tomorrow, just like we did on Saturday. It’s a certain rotation but the ‘rotation’ can also be ‘we’re good enough to play a few others.’ No, no, no – we have more than 11 players who can start a game of football for us and that’s why we’ve done it so many times.

“And we can still do it tomorrow.”

The slot made five changes in total The side that lost to Unitedwith Jeremy Frampong, Andy Robertson, Curtis Jones and Florian Wirtz all coming into the team, but Hugo Iktyk is undoubtedly the standout call for Salah.

It is the first time since he joined the club in 2017 that Salah has not been named in Liverpool’s starting XI for two consecutive Champions League games.

It’s a decision that makes it a game in which Slott will be desperate to stop the rot after four straight defeats – Liverpool haven’t lost five on the bounce since 1953 – including a loss to Galatasaray last time out in the Champions League.

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Salah will certainly be starting what isn’t exactly a winnable game, but a game he will Really If he were in any form, he would love to win to stave off his self-diagnosed crisis.

For the first time in his Liverpool career there have been suggestions that the Egyptian doesn’t deserve a place in the team, and he has hurt Liverpool while failing to nullify that weakness with his goals and assists.

Jones comes in for McAlister, unsurprisingly after the Argentine’s similar lack of form this term, with Milos Kerkez being taken out of the firing line after being given the pelters for most of his Reds career so far, while Frampong started to be Liverpool’s biggest threat off the bench against United.

As Slott was very keen to point out, this isn’t a “wandering” team, it’s one he feels is best equipped to beat Frankfurt. Make no mistake, Salah has been left out.