MO THE MERRIER
Salah back to his best as hat-trick sinks Cherries and puts Liverpool top
HE’S not bad, that Mo Salah. Be it running down the wing, as the song goes, or running laps around Asmir Begovic for the hat-trick, he really is half decent at this lark.
That it was ever in doubt feels a little silly now. Most folk thought it, and there’s no great shame in that — his standard at the start of the campaign was just not quite what it was last time round.
And yet here we are in December and he is very much the star on the tree, shining ever brighter the colder it gets. Look at the numbers and just take them in. Nine goals in his past 10 starts since October 20, if you count all the competitions, and 12 since the beginning in August — the opposite of the fairweather footballer and the opposite of a one-season wonder, too.
More than that, he may just be the best hope we all have for an interesting title race, as well, given Liverpool are seemingly the only team with the capacity to rival Manchester City and Salah is the most marvellous part of it.
That’s not to say they are a one-man band. That would be a ludicrous thing to argue when the XI here contained Alisson, Virgil van Dijk and Roberto Firmino — and Jurgen Klopp had the luxury of starting Sadio Mane on the bench.
But it is equally obvious that the team is elevated to another plane when the Egyptian is on form, as goals one, two and four in this match showed, with Steve Cook scoring an own goal for the third.
It was Liverpool’s fifth win in succession and all the other figures paint a rosy picture. Quite aside from Liverpool hitting their highest points tally for this stage of a Premier League season, they
have also matched 2008 for their best ever sequence without defeat — 17 games, factoring in the final game of last season. Good going, that.
For Bournemouth, who were without Callum Wilson because of a hamstring problem, it was actually a decent first half, to the point it was debatable whether they deserved to be 1-0 down, especially as the goal was marginally offside. But top teams can undo good efforts in brutal ways and that was the tale of the second half, meaning it is now five defeats in six games after a nasty run of fixtures. Tellingly, perhaps, even Manchester City on their own pitch couldn’t do as much damage to Howe’s side as Liverpool did.
And that with a side featuring five changes to the one which beat Burnley in midweek. Joe Gomez, Alberto Moreno, Jordan Henderson, Divock Origi and Daniel Sturridge stepped out and Joel Matip, Andrew Robertson, Fabinho, Georginio Wijnaldum and Salah came in — a mark of their squad strength is that neither of the selections was weak.
The only personnel concern for Klopp came from the loss of Gomez to his broken leg against Burnley, and with Trent Alexander-Arnold needing a rest, that positioned James Milner at right back for his 500th Premier League match. Judging from how often Bournemouth attacked his flank, they saw him as a target, but it says much about Milner’s reliability that so little came of the attacks. Ryan Fraser, David Brooks and Junior Stanislas were all given a crack in the leftwing spot and save for a spell early in the second half, they got no return from the 32-year-old.
That is not to say Liverpool looked entirely strong at the back because there were vulnerabilities. Inside three minutes, Alisson spilled a pass to Fraser and midway through the period Joel Matip’s questionable positioning let Brooks in for a good chance. Added to a volley at the far post that Nathan Ake miscued at 1-0 down, they were shaky moments from Liverpool.
But that is part of the beauty of their season. On the back of a reasonably understated half, they were still able to close the period in
front, albeit fortuitously, with Begovic palming straight to Salah after a long-range shot from Firmino. A replay showed Salah was a shade offside at the point of Firmino’s strike.
Salah’s second could be traced to an error by Cook, who gave away possession to Firmino, but following his lay-off to Salah, it was about the brilliance of the Egyptian. With Cook kicking at his heels on the chase, the forward raced away, sidestepped Ake and beat Begovic.
Bournemouth had a pair of chances in retaliation but were killed off when Cook back-heeled a volley past Begovic off an Andrew Robertson cross.
The centre half’s miserable afternoon cranked up when a loose ball off his challenge put Salah through for his hat-trick goal. Salah subsequently ran around Begovic twice before flicking past Ake on the line.
A master at work, really.