Liverpool forward Mohamed Salah overlooked former boss Jürgen Klopp when asked to name his favourite manager of his career, instead lavishing Luciano Spalletti with praise.
The nature of the relationship between Salah and Klopp during their seven shared years at Anfield was often the subject of significant speculation, with a handful of on-field agreements hinting at tension between the pair.
Regardless of what was going on behind the scenes, Salah and Klopp combined to devastating effect at Liverpool. Across 349 games under the boss, Salah racked up 211 goals and 94 assists, while only Roberto Firmino (355) has ever made more appearances under Klopp. The Egyptian, however, leads the way when it comes to total minutes at 28,207.
In a recent round of quickfire questions with France Football, Salah was asked to name his favourite manager from across his entire career. After a brief pause, former Roma manager Spalletti got the nod.
A recent biography on Salah, Simon Hughes’s Chasing Salah, discussed the 33-year-old’s admiration for his former boss. It was claimed that Salah would tell friends he had learned more from Spalletti during his 62 games under the Italian at Roma.
Importantly, however, there is not believed to be any bad blood between Klopp and Salah, who opened up on his relationship with the German in an interview with Sky Sports in January.
“[The relationship with Klopp] is fine,” he explained. “We text from time to time, in the last three months we texted more than we texted in the last seven years, honestly.
“I’m not putting fire anywhere, I’m just saying in a nice way, we text every second game or something. He’s fine, his family is fine, he texted me about my family and Christmas and stuff, so all good.”
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Mohamed Salah Snubs Jurgen Klopp When Naming Favourite Manager.