PARIS – Mohamed Salah played a starring role in Liverpool’s hunt for a historic quadruple, as the Egyptian expressed his wish to win the Ballon d’Or prize.
Salah enjoyed yet another prolific season for Liverpool and continued to see records tumble seemingly at every turn.
In the voting for the 2021 prize, the Liverpool superstar finished seventh, which many saw as disrespectful. And the Egyptian has admitted to being ‘shocked’ by last year’s placement and that he will keep thriving to win the award.
“I want to be recognised as the best player in the world. And the Ballon d’Or is at the forefront of my goals,” Salah said in an interview with France Football.
“I want to win it to join George Weah, the only African. It’s true that I was shocked by my ranking in 2021 (seventh).
The former Chelsea and AS Roma winger is the only Egyptian player to have been nominated for the award, which was established in 1956.
Liverpool’s No. 11 played like a man possessed at the start of the 2021/22 season and ended the campaign with an astonishing 31 goals and 16 assists.
There are rivals in abundance, Real Madrid’s Karim Benzema for one and Sadio Mane surely to be another, but Salah’s desire to lift the gong is clear, whether it be this year or the next.
“For this year, the defeat against Real Madrid is a disadvantage, even if I played a good game in the final,” the 29-year-old Salah added.
“But it doesn’t cancel out everything I’ve achieved for months. Let’s wait for the vote. And if I’m not Ballon d’Or in 2022, I’ll do everything I can to be the next one.”
“Last summer, on holiday in Greece, lying in front of the sea, I was asking myself how to be a better footballer, who is getting harder and harder because I always have two or three defenders behind me,” the Egyptian star said according to thisisanfield.com.
“I have to invent new ways to open up the game in front of me, to find other spaces. This reflection has paid off, my statistics have improved.
“My [opposing] defender has to say to himself: ‘Damn, him again!’. My goal is that he doesn’t have time to catch his breath. He has to feel in danger every moment of the ninety minutes.”
Salah said that Liverpool ‘deserved’ to beat Real Madrid in the UEFA Champions League final.
“We deserved to win, we had more chances, I got two or three quite big ones but, each time, Thibaut Courtois made incredible saves,” Salah noted in the wide-ranging interview.
“It’s his job, Real recruited him for that. He earned his man-of-the-match award. It was his evening.”
The loss last month was the second time the Spanish giants have beaten the Reds in a European Cup final under Jurgen Klopp since the German took over in 2015.
Salah was taken off in the first half of the final in 2018 due to a dislocated shoulder and had used that incident as motivation to not only get to this year’s final in Paris but win the competition.
Though it wasn’t to be, Salah has said that he will once again use the defeat as motivation to reach the final in Istanbul next season and win the Champions League, something he and his team-mates did 12 months after losing to Madrid four years ago.
He said: “Here again, I draw inspiration from the past. In 2018 we lost the Champions League final, already against Real Madrid (1-3) and the following season we were European champions. That’s what I’m aiming for. We must always look ahead, not complain.”
Salah revealed the lengths he goes to stay at the top of the game, as he discussed cutting down on fast food and filling his house with medical machinery. Salah said: ‘Two rooms in our house are dedicated to different fitness machines, bodybuilding.
‘At home I can also do cryotherapy, there is a hyperbaric chamber. I am constantly looking to improve my physical condition.’
‘It’s true that I like to say that my house looks like a hospital, [but] my wife doesn’t like that! [She] says that I spend more time with my machines than with her!’
Aside from his exercise and recovery regimen, the Liverpool star also maintains an incredibly disciplined diet.
He said according to Daily Mail: ‘I prefer broccoli, sweet potatoes, fish, chicken and always salad.
‘When I indulge in a great restaurant in London, I prefer sushi.
‘I eat pizza once a month at the most. I love hamburgers, but I hardly ever eat them because afterwards I feel heavy!’
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