Let’s not forget goal-machine Rush

MUCH acclaim for Mohamed Salah as he passed Robbie Fowler’s total of 128 Premier League goals for Liverpool, but let us not forget that football did exist before the advent of the top flight in its current form 31 years ago. With that in mind, it is hard to see Salah, or anyone else, ever catching the great Ian Rush, Liverpool’s record modern goalscorer.

Rush, still looking as though he could give Jurgen Klopp half an hour off the bench at the age of 61, racked up 229 Division One goals for the club during two spells straddling his time at Juventus. Salah, 31 in June, does have a significantly greater goalsper-game ratio (a goal every game and a half as opposed to Rush’s goal every two games) but the day we start to dish out awards for stats such as that is the day we should all go off and watch American football.

And one more thing. Salah and Rush rightly take their place on an Anfield mural that sits at the top of Stanley Park depicting the club’s great goalscorers. Dalglish, Aldridge, Keegan, Mane, Firmino, Torres. Kuyt, even. But there is no Michael Owen. Do three years at Manchester United count more than a century of Premier League goals for Liverpool? Maybe they do. Discuss.