pool crisis Klopp's decision to substitute Salah will only fuel rumours about the Egyptian’s future at the club

JURGEN Klopp’s decision to substitute Mohamed Salah with half an hour to go against Chelsea on Thursday night was hard to explain - but nothing has made sense at Liverpool over the last two months.

Klopp’s decision failed to avert a FIFTH successive defeat on home soil and even though this tortuous season is not over yet, the Liverpool boss must be counting down the minutes until the last ball is kicked and he has been put out of his misery.

I never thought I’d see the day when a Liverpool team would lose five successive matches at Anfield, but it’s in the record books now.

When you consider the team that has lost the five games did it on the back of a 68-game unbeaten run at home, it adds to the mystery around what has happened.

How can a team win the title by a mile last season and then fall to such an extent that they now look highly likely to miss out on a top-four finish in the Premier League?

It’s a question everyone in football has been asking for a few weeks now – and I suspect Klopp is also pondering this very dilemma ahead of today’s game against Fulham.

Liverpool and their manager have run out of energy and belief, with their slump in form as alarming as any I have seen from a team of this quality.

You can point to the absence of central defenders Virgil van Dijk, Joe Gomez and Joel Matip while the absence of fans at Anfield has also hurt Liverpool more than most clubs as the soul of the club has been ripped away.

Yet we are now at a point where you wonder where this is going to end, with the Salah substitution evidence that Klopp is desperately scrambling to solve his crisis.

When I see managers and teams struggling in this manner, it reminds me of my final days as a manager at Tranmere.

Yes it was at a lower level than Klopp is working at, but the principles are the same.

As the manager, you feel the pressure to solve all the problems, come up with the answers and guide the players out of their slump.

Well, the truth is, there are times when a manager is helpless and looking at Klopp right now, he seems to have run out of ideas.

As a manager, you can’t see the wood from the trees when your team fall off the rails, with the scale of Liverpool’s demise adding to the agony Klopp is living through.

The defence has been decimated by the injuries at centre-back and that has clearly affected Trent Alexander-Arnold’s form.

Then you look at the midfield and, again, we can point to the absence of Jordan Henderson and Fabinho as part of the reason why it has malfunctioned.

Yet the biggest concern right now has to be the front three and you wonder whether we are seeing the end of an attacking trio that has served Liverpool so well during a highly successful period in the club’s history.

It made his substitution harder to explain, as Roberto Firmino clearly should have been the man who came off when Diogo Jota was introduced.

Sadio Mane was also having a bad night, yet Klopp took Salah off and it was a decision that will fuel the rumours about the Egyptian’s future at the club.

Salah’s decision to speak to a Spanish newspaper in December suggesting he was a big admirer of Real Madrid and Barcelona, followed by the appearance of his mate on TV saying his pal wasn’t happy at Liverpool must have set a few alarm bells ringing.

Throw in his muted goal celebrations since then and Klopp’s decision to leave him out of a few games and you have a chain of events that will create a few headlines.

His agent also sent out a cryptic tweet as soon as Salah was substituted the other night, so it would be no massive surprise if pushes for a move this summer.

From what we saw in the January transfer window, Liverpool don’t have the finances to spend big in the transfer market.

So they might need to sell before they can buy ahead of next season.

I don’t know if this is realistic, but let’s imagine a scenario that sees Salah leaving for big money and Erling Haaland coming in from Borussia Dortmund.

It would be sad to see Salah leave but something new is needed and it may need a sale to generate the money to freshen things up.

Klopp doesn’t have a player who can change the course of a game from the bench and in truth, his lack of a Plan B has been really exposed in recent weeks.

Liverpool play one way, they try and pass their way to success using high tempo football and at this moment the opposition has worked out how to stop them.

I still believe things will change when Van Dijk is fit, the fans are back roaring the team on at Anfield and the batteries have been charged for a manager and a set of players clearly running on empty.

Yet that hope will not help them against Fulham today and with their confidence at Anfield now clearly shattered, I have no confidence in them ending their miserable run on home soil.

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Online Editors