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Liverpool forward Mohamed Salah has challenged the new signings who have arrived at the club this summer to prove themselves at Anfield after they joined the team that won the Premier League title last season.
Winning the league with relative ease in the end, with four matches to spare, Arne Slot's side has since gone on a spending spree, smashing its transfer record to bring in Florian Wirtz from Bayer Leverkusen. Jeremie Frimpong, Milos Kerkez, Hugo Ekitike and Giorgi Mamardashvili have also arrived for a combined sum of something close to $400M.
"I just don't want people to forget that we won the Premier League with the players we [already] have," Salah told LFCTV. "The ones coming now, they need to earn that thing in the media, they also need to show their quality and give it all to the fans.
"I don't want the fans to be just overexcited and also put pressure on them before they did anything. It's very good signings, but they need to show that in the games and to show that to the club."
"So far they have been great," Virgil van Dijk added. "Obviously, it's not easy to come to a club like Liverpool and show yourself straight away.
"But I'm very confident that the guys that are added to the team, they can play a good part in hopefully success this season.
"But there's a lot more (than) just playing football to being part of Liverpool. That's what we are also here for, we have to be there for the guys — and we will be."
Some of the new Liverpool players will make their first appearance at Wembley for the Reds later today, taking on Crystal Palace in the Community Shield at Wembley.
Wirtz, Frimpong, Ekitike and Kerkez are all likely to play from the start in the final fixture before Liverpool kicks off the new Premier League campaign against Bournemouth.
"Normally, you have to play numerous games before you can win something," Slot said ahead of Crystal Palace. "If it's the League Cup, FA Cup, let alone [the] Premier League or Champions League, normally you win something in the end of the season.
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"Now we have a chance to win something in the beginning of the season. Unfortunately, we face a very good Crystal Palace that have been very difficult to win against for us, because we played 1-1 against them in the last game of the season.
"They showed in the last final — and even in the semi-final, by the way, as well — how difficult it is to win a one-off game [against] them. I think most of the players that they have are still there, so even more reason to know what a difficult team it is to play against."
Liverpool.com says: The new players that have come in all look very exciting. Salah is going to love playing alongside Wirtz, and there have already been signs during pre-season that the pair are forging a strong partnership.
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