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Emile Heskey has expressed his concern that Mohamed Salah’s bombshell interview may have split the Liverpool dressing room.
The club – and the world of soccer – is still reeling from the Egyptian’s remarkable comments in the Elland Road mixed zone last Saturday, when Salah publicly criticized Liverpool and Arne Slot.
That resulted in Salah being omitted from the squad for the midweek trip to Inter Milan, but he is set to return to the roster on Saturday against Brighton & Hove Albion. After that, Liverpool will hope to draw a line under the saga when the 33-year-old departs for the Africa Cup of Nations, although there could be more long-term ramifications.
Heskey, a veteran of Premier League locker rooms, believes the episode will impact the squad.
“It’s a bit of a mess. I’m from an era where your dirty laundry gets sorted out behind closed doors,” the former Reds striker exclusively told Liverpool.com, via Netbet football odds.
“I’ve seen a lot worse where nothing comes — this could have been dealt with better. You’re talking about one of the Premier League’s best-ever players; one of Liverpool’s best-ever players.
“I think they'll be split,” Heskey continued when asked about how the squad will have reacted. “At the end of the day, you're talking about the talisman in that dressing room for years.
“The numbers that he's putting up have been an absolute joke. So he earns that respect from what he does on the pitch, week in, week out – and the way that he lives his life as well, which is a testament to him.
“So it will be split within the changing room. Even some of the other lads who have sat on the bench for a long time and just got on with stuff. ‘You're three games on the bench and you're getting upset’.
“Let's back the players who are out there, and that's one of the things that the players will probably be disappointed about. You have got to back everyone who's out there because they're not in the best of runs right now.”
While Heskey feels that Salah’s interview will affect dressing room dynamics, he claims the saga could galvanize the group, especially with Salah back in the squad to face Brighton.
“It can help. A lot of players will bottle things up, or hold things in, but once you have this as a disagreement and it all comes out, you can say, ‘Okay, let's move on’.”
“Sometimes you've got to have a little bit of a disagreement,” he added. “We all have differences, don't we? When I was playing, every single day [there were arguments]; nothing ever came out. It's managed. And again, players need to do that as well at times.
“You’d have a leadership group that will come together and they'd have to figure stuff out. You don't want it to become a problem.”
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