Why Salah Deserves Big Money And It Won't Destroy Liverpool's Team Spirit Or Future Contracts

Mohamed Salah's contract extension has become a major talking point as the forward only has one year left on his deal and is not close to agreeing on a new contract.

Salah reportedly earns less than players like Anthony Martial, Timo Werner, Romelu Lukaku, Bruno Fernandes and more despite being the Premier League's best player since his arrival.

The latest offer to the player was worth £230k, as per The Athletic. A few fans are apprehensive about giving Salah a huge deal as Liverpool are known to not break their rigid wage structure for any player.

However, I don't believe that offering someone of Salah's calibre a new contract with big money will negatively affect the team spirit or set a bad precedent for the future. Here's why:

Liverpool players' salaries are based on bonuses

A good amount of the players' wages is based on bonuses - for example, Salah himself pocketed over £300K a week last season (as per Forbes) when his base salary is reported to be around £200k by most reliable football outlets.

Liverpool's wage bill was ranked second-highest in England at the end of the 2019/20 season despite the highest base package being around £200k a week. Meanwhile, players like Paul Pogba are on significantly higher base packages but Man United's wage bill was lesser than the Reds'.

This suggests that Liverpool indeed don't have major disparities between wages as the players' earnings are close to each other. However, this also proves that a lot of the players' bonus packages involve winning titles.

To earn a lot of money at Liverpool, you also have to be really, really good at what you do. FSG don't hand out bumper contracts to anyone unless their quality is proven.

Having Salah at Liverpool benefits the players

The Reds got bonuses for qualifying for the Champions League in a tough 2020/21 season, where Salah was the team's top scorer and dragged us to the top four with a lot of crucial goals down the stretch.

Last season, the Egyptian King won the Premier League Golden Boot and Playmaker Award, becoming only the third player since 1992 to do so in England's top flight of football. While the entire team is responsible for the quadruple push, Salah was surely the best player in the squad.

Similarly, winning the Premier League and Champions League would not have been possible without him either as he was our best attacker in all of those seasons.

Clearly, Salah being here only helps the others. They must surely know that this player being their teammate is increasing the chances of winning more trophies. This leads to more money. Why, then, would any player be jealous or upset over Salah being getting paid more?

In fact, rival fans from Chelsea or Manchester City are already dreaming of signing the forward if he becomes a free agent. Both those clubs are known to pay their players a lot and will have no problem matching Salah's reported demands of around £300k a week.

Liverpool players are as close as a family

If you go through what any Liverpool teammate (or the manager) has said of Salah, you will find that they all love and appreciate him. For example, Klopp said that his relationship with Salah is great while players like Andy Robertson have praised the forward's mentality and quality in the past.

The team clearly loves and respects Salah and media outlets such as The Athletic have reported that Liverpool is like a family - the squad members are close friends and have the utmost admiration for each other.

What's there to be upset about then if the team's best player earns more than the others? We never heard stories over Barcelona players being upset over Lionel Messi's wages - I don't see why this case should be any different.

Not everyone deserves a Salah-level contract

There's a lot of talk over future contract talks being compromised if Salah gets what he wants. Let's put his career at Liverpool into perspective first to understand if he deserves this money.

In five full seasons here, Salah has three Golden Boots, one PFA Player of the Year Award (he might win again this year) and has been Liverpool's top goalscorer every single season since his arrival, scoring 156 goals in 254 games.

He barely misses games due to injury, has no drama outside football (apart from the contract extension saga) and is easily one of the world's top five players with at least three world-class seasons ahead of him.

If anyone does want the money that Salah is asking for, they will have to match his level of productivity to make such a request. Imagine if Naby Keita walked in and asked for £300k a week - he'd be laughed out of the office!

Moreover, four of our team's core players (Trent, Robertson, Alisson and Van Dijk) recently signed new long-term deals in the summer of 2021 and won't be signing a new deal any time soon.

Sadio Mane might be leaving which will see Liverpool escaping another long-drawn-out contract saga - therefore, some time left before Liverpool need to worry about anyone else making the demands that Salah has.

Of course, I have to mention that the club is above everyone and if Salah is asking for ridiculous amounts like half-a-million per week, no player is worth that. But as long as the demands are in check, I see no reason to deny him what he should be earning.

The summary

Here's the bottom line - the Egyptian King deserves a massive contract and the squad, more than all of us, benefit from Salah staying here too.

This narrative of the teammates possibly being unhappy and asking for more money makes zero sense from any logical viewpoint.

If anything, Liverpool would do well to meet Salah in the middle and pay him a club-record salary because if they don't, then it sets a bad precedent for the world's best players that the Reds can't pay you big money even if you have earned it.

Source: Tribuna.com