Prem’s financial powers
if they’re to climb back up the ladder.
When it became clear that it would be a Liverpool v Real Madrid Champions League final last season, Salah talked in an interview of seeking revenge for 2018.
It was no surprise that the defeat still gnawed at the Egyptian, even though he won the competition a year later.
Liverpool were well on top when Salah got injured — or was taken out by Sergio Ramos, depending on your point of view.
Not only did it ruin Salah’s biggest day at club level, it meant he played a largely peripheral role at that year’s World Cup.
There was to be no revenge in Paris last season. And Real have hurt Salah and Liverpool three times in the Champions League in the Klopp era.
Nobody will be more motivated than the Egyptian when they meet again. Liverpool will need him at full throttle.
THE PREMIER League’s dominance of the international transfer market has been highlighted again in a new FIFA report.
The world governing body’s Global Transfer Report for 2022 found English clubs spent €2bn on international deals in the January and summer windows last year, with Italian clubs a distant second with €619.4m spent.
England’s total spending accounted for just over a third of the global total for international deals, which FIFA put at €6bn.
This was an increase of 33.5 per cent compared to 2021 but still lower than the record mark of €6.76bn set in 2019.
English clubs were the buyers in six of the 10 biggest transfers identified in the report, which included Manchester City’s purchase of Erling Haaland from Borussia Dortmund, Liverpool’s signing of Luis Diaz from
Porto and Manchester United’s recruitment of Brazilian duo Antony and Casemiro.
Total
The top 10 deals accounted for 12.5 per cent of the overall total spend, FIFA said, while the top 100 deals accounted for almost 50 per cent of it.
France’s was found to be the association making the most from international transfer deals, with total receipts of €680.94m.
Premier League clubs recouped €552.2m, the fourth-highest total.
Deloitte said Premier League clubs had already smashed the previous record for spending in the current January transfer window, when there was still a week of it to go.
The financial services firm said their gross spend by 3pm on Tuesday was €500m, already surpassing the previous record of €489m set in January 2018.