Virgil Van Dijk fires back at criticism of Mohamed Salah’s Liverpool form

Virgil Van Dijk fires back at criticism of Mohamed Salah’s Liverpool form

Liverpool defender Virgil van Dijk thinks that criticism of Mohamed Salah’s Liverpool form is unnecessary and says his team-mate will be ‘bouncing back as soon as possible”

Salah is currently the Premier League’s top scorer this season, reaching an impressive 20 goals and 11 assists in 29 appearances, but hasn’t scored a non-penalty goals in almost two months.

The 29-year-old form has dipped since returning from the Africa Cup of Nations tournament with Egypt at the beginning of February, in which he came out having lost to teamate Sadio Mane and Senegal in the final of the competition.

But,Van Dijk, thinks Salah is being judged wrongly and believs the Egyptian quality will tell soon enough.

“It’s so easy to make judgements about him’, Van Dijk said in the aftermath of the Reds’ FA Cup semi-final win over Manchester City on Saturday afternoon.

“In my opinion he is so important for us, and he will always be. His goals will come, I’m not worried about any of that.”

While Salah has struggled to find the net, others have taken on the scoring burden for Liverpool in recent games, with Roberto Firmino and Sadio Mane each scoring braces against Benfica and City in the past week respectively.

Mohamed Salah endured another frustrating night as he failed to find the back of the net (Getty Images)

For Van Dijk, Salah is still involved in the team’s excellent attacking play and manages to create opportunities for teammates.

“He is creating dangerous moments,’ the Dutch defender added. ‘The City game [in the Premier League at the Etihad Stadium] he had an amazing assist, very important of course.

“Obviously it’s been a tough two months, but we are all human being and he is such a fantastic pro with amazing qualities that he will be bouncing back as soon as possible. I’m not worried at all.”

In other news, I made Liverpool what it is says, Ralf Rangnick