Salah not giving up on Premier League title after Liverpool beat Man City
Mohamed Salah celebrates after scoring a goal. Reuters
Egyptian striker Mohamed Salah gave his Liverpool team the moral dose required to try to launch the season, by overthrowing rival and guest, Manchester City, the defending champion, by scoring the winning goal 1-0 on Sunday in the eleventh stage of the English Football League.
Liverpool inflicted its rivals City on the first defeat in the Premier League in the last 23 games, especially since the loss to Tottenham 2-3 on February 19, so that the German coach Jurgen Klopp’s team achieved its first victory in the Premier League since August 31, when it beat Newcastle 2-1.
The third successive victory of the "Reds" team against City (3-2 in the cup semi-finals last season and 3-1 in the Community Shield at the beginning of this season), comes after a sweeping victory over Rangers 7-1 in the Champions League in a meeting during which Salah scored a historic hat-trick at a span of six minutes and 12 seconds after entering as a substitute.
Liverpool raised its points with this third victory in nine matches to 13 points in eighth place, while City's balance froze at 23 in second place, four points behind the leaders Arsenal, who were the biggest beneficiary of this result, after achieving at the expense of its host Leeds, its seventh victory in a row at both levels.
Salah The Fighter
At the "Anfield" stadium, Liverpool and City did not offer much at the beginning of the meeting, which began with the last chance for German Ilkay Gundogan, the Brazilian goalkeeper Alison Becker succeeded in blocking it (15), to which Portuguese Diogo Jota responded by trying to block the Brazilian Ederson (21).
After a first header over the crossbar, Norwegian Erling Halland had a chance to put City ahead before the end of the first half, but Alisson had his header attempt on the lookout (41).
At the beginning of the second half, Salah was very close to putting Liverpool in the lead after his penetration from the middle of the field almost, but his shot went past the right post after Ederson touched the ball (50), then City thought he opened the scoring through Phil Foden after Halland's incursion, but the referee He used "VAR" to cancel the goal after it became clear to him that the Norwegian made a mistake on the Brazilian Fabinho in building the attack (54).
Halland was close to compensating for this opportunity with a shot from the outskirts of the area, but Alison had him on the lookout (64), then after a series of mutual opportunities, Salah said his word with his third goal in the league this season and came after a free kick for City that easily reached Alison, so he played it directly towards Al-Masry, who benefited from a mistake in the interception of the Portuguese Joao Cancelo to singled out and shot from the outskirts of the area to the right of the Brazilian goalkeeper (76).
With this goal, Salah directly participated in 14 goals against City in all competitions with Liverpool, with nine goals and five assists, which is the most against any competitor for his current club.
The confrontation erupted in the last minutes with the players entering into altercations and Klopp's objection to the referee, which led to his expulsion, but the result in the end remained unchanged so that Liverpool came out with a victory that contained a lot of moral impulse.
Salah commented on his team's situation regarding his chances of fighting for the title, telling "Sky Sports" that "we do not have to think about the title now, but on a personal level, I always like to fight for a title. In my head, I will fight for him (the league title) but we have to focus more and take it one game at a time.”
"It is better not to put ourselves under more pressure because of the difference between the first and the second, but of course we will play for the title."
