Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mane have been playing together in Liverpool for the past few years. They come from two of the best footballing nations in Africa, Egypt and Senegal.
The two countries met in the AFCON 2021 final where Mane’s Senegal got the better of Salah’s Egypt in the penalties and won the trophy. The pair again went head-to-head on international duty last week and Senegal eliminated Egypt on penalties to qualify for the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022.
Senegal’s rivalry with Egypt in recent times has brought up the talks of the Salah and Mane rivalry. Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp has now talked about the rumoured Salah and Mane rivalry.
Rumoured Salah and Mane rivalry
“You play together in a team and both want to score goals. That is normal. We want them to score goals. There are situations where one doesn’t see the other and doesn’t finish the situation off and then we immediately say, ‘what is the reason for that?’”
“The reason for that is that in this situation he thinks: ‘I can put it in here’. And then the goalie has the same idea and the ball does not go in. Then it is easy to say afterwards if you had passed the ball then it would have been in.”
“I have these moments outside but when I watch the situation back I accept there is no chance. It was really difficult to pass the ball and these kinds of things. There is nothing. That is how it is. We are human beings and from time to time we make wrong decisions, but it is nothing personal.”
Klopp further added: “We just want to score a goal and realise a little bit later it was the wrong decision. It is nothing to do with any kind of rivalry with another player on your team, it is just the wrong decision.”
“No doubt about it they are not only close, they are well educated, they are good boys, they are good humans. Sadio and Mo would consider themselves for sure as friends. They probably have ‘best friends’ somewhere, maybe here or at home, and this situation would be challenging even if it was your best friend.”
