Roberto is a Firm favourite for Gary

MO SALAH has hogged all the headlines for his sensational season which can end in a scary fright night for Real Madrid on Saturday.

But Gary Lineker has singled out Salah’s Liverpool team-mate Roberto Firmino for special praise, too, and called him, “One of the best all-round strikers in world football”.

Lineker, 57, knows a thing or two about sticking the ball in the back of the net from his glittering career with Leicester City, Everton and Tottenham Hotspur in England, Barcelona in Spain and Nagoya Grampus Eight in Japan.

He scored 238 league goals and 48 times for the Three Lions in his distinguished playing days spanning almost 20 years. Now he cannot rate fellow goalscorer Firmino highly enough as the Brazil star prepares to get his shooting boots on in Kiev against the Spanish giants.

Lineker (below) said: “He’s a brilliant all-round player.

“He works his socks off, he’s got a great touch, he can hold it up, he sees a pass and he can score a goal.

“He’s good from outside the box, inside the box and he scores with his head.

“I think he’s one of the best all-round strikers in world football. “He’s terrific. An all-round striker. “Yes, obviously he’s been overshadowed a little bit by Salah’s great season. “But you can say the same for Sadio Mane.” Lineker, who applauds, too, the signing of centre-half Virgil van Dijk from Southampton in January, knows that the Champions League Final will again be the perfect platform for Cristiano Ronaldo to display his spellbinding talents.

The BT Sport presenter added: “He is a phenomenal goalscorer and is still defying logic with a couple more years left in him. “You talk about Ronaldo being the biggest threat, which obviously he is, but possibly the biggest threat is Liverpool’s lack of experience.

“The fact is that they have not been there in a final.

“It doesn’t necessarily mean they will freeze.

“But if they don’t, if they perform as they have done in the competition, I think they can do it.

“Looking from the outside you have to say that Real Madrid are the favourites because of their experience and fi nal know-how.

“But if Liverpool do turn up and are not fazed by the fi nal occasion, I can see them winning it.”