'Thought about' - Arne Slot makes Mo Salah substitution admission before scoring Liverpool penalty

Arne Slot admitted he had contemplated substituting Mo Salah before he became Liverpool’s hero at Burnley.

Salah netted a stoppage-time penalty to earn the Reds a 1-0 victory at Turf Moor. It appeared that the Premier League champions’ perfect start to their title defence would come to an end as they struggled to break down a stubborn Clarets rearguard.

The visitors created a dearth of goalscoring chances throughout the encounter. Despite scoring 32 goals in all competitions last season, Salah was subdued throughout the game and barely threatened Burnley. But after Burnley’s Hannibal handballed Jeremie Frimpong’s cross, Salah came up with the decisive moment when beating goalkeeper Martin Dubravka from the penalty spot.

Asked if Slot thought about taking Salah off, the head coach replied at his post-match press conference: “If you need a goal and things are not going really well – although in the second half I felt we were better and better and better and we came closer and closer and closer – but I thought about almost every substitution.

“But in the end, you always come back to: ‘I don’t want to leave this stadium with a draw thinking I didn’t bring all my attackers in, all the guys that can score a goal.’ In another game you maybe wonder is it worth the risk to play with seven attackers, but against a team that plays with 11 players in their own 18-yard box that’s not, I think, a big risk then and that’s why we decided to do that. And taking Mo off – if you need a goal, it will probably happen this season or maybe next season, but it probably won’t happen a lot.”

Late goal again

Liverpool left it late yet again against Burnley, having bagged in the 100th minute to earn a 3-2 win over Newcastle and 83rd minute to deliver a 1-0 triumph against Arsenal. The Reds boss was asked if it showed the mentality of his team or whether it is a concern. He replied: “A bit of both. I know how hard it is to create chances against a team that’s with 11 players in their 18-yard box. It’s by the way very good that they do this because they’ve almost got a point so I’m not saying anything negative about it, I’m just trying to explain how difficult it is against a Premier League team because they are very good players as well. If they defend with all of them back and they hardly try to bring the ball out from the back because the goalkeeper every time plays long, and we don’t score from a set-piece, then the only thing you can score from is open play – and open play is quite difficult if you have to outplay 11 players in their own 18-yard box.

“That’s what we saw today – you come close, close, close but every time there is a foot in between or whatever. [There were] no really open chances, so a draw was probably what we expected throughout the game but we tried also with the substitutions we made to bring all the players we have that can attack on the pitch. I think we were six or seven in the end. I don’t know if that has anything to do with us scoring the goal but we did create the penalty and just before that [had] a big chance from Jeremie [Frimpong]. So, relief. Lucky.”