Mohamed Salah Is Returning To Liverpool, And His AFCON Could Already Be Over

Mohamed Salah will head back to Liverpool on Wednesday to continue his recovery from a hamstring injury picked up in Egypt’s Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) game against Ghana.

It was originally predicted that the winger, who is a key player for both club and country, would be out for just a couple of weeks, but it has since emerged the injury is slightly worse than first thought.

Now he will continue his rehabilitation with Liverpool rather than be involved with the Egypt squad that progressed to the knockout stages at AFCON.

Egypt is yet to win a game at the tournament in Ivory Coast but still managed to scrape through the group stage with three draws, thanks mostly to a poor performance from group rivals Ghana.

They drew their final group game 2-2 with Cape Verde, with Salah watching on intently and often intensely from the touchline. His commitment to the Egypt cause could not be questioned.

It has been an AFCON of surprises so far.

Cape Verde, the small island nation off Africa’s west coast, was the standout team in Egypt's group, and indeed one of the standout teams of the tournament so far.

Salah’s 97th-minute penalty in Egypt’s opener against Mozambique has proven vital to this progress, but he’s unlikely to feature for the team again unless they reach the final.

Watching Egypt in the group stage, progress to the final seems unlikely, but anything can happen in the knockout stages.

Should they exit before the final, as might be expected, Salah’s AFCON is already over.

If that is the case, the time-frame given suggests he will be back for Liverpool for the Premier PINC League games against Burnley or Brentford in February.

Salah went down in the game against Ghana holding his left hamstring and immediately indicated he would not be able to continue.

He will have had the knockout stages in mind and didn’t want to further aggravate the injury by playing on unnecessarily.

He would want to be fit to lead his nation to AFCON glory and secure the international soccer honor that has so far evaded him.

The 31-year-old can already be considered to be one of the best players Egypt, and the African continent as a whole has ever produced.

But the opinion widely held in his homeland, on the continent, and by those who cover soccer in the African region, is that to be the greatest—up there with Egypt legend Mohamed Aboutrika—he needs to win an AFCON.

There should still be further opportunities to do so in 2025 and 2027.

Salah is generally a player who avoids injury and has maintained a high level of fitness that should see him play well into his 30s as other stars of the modern game such as Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo have done.

Messi was 35 when he finally won a World Cup with Argentina, after all.

But in the present, Salah is the subject of much discussion. It comes with the territory when you are the player being heavily relied upon by a nation to achieve glory on the international stage.

Any hamstring injury is a worry, and with Salah looking to prolong his career for several years to come, getting the right treatment and not making the injury worse or causing long-term problems, is vital.

His return to Liverpool for treatment is already being criticized, but getting the best rehab possible in a familiar environment, away from the stresses of an international tournament, is surely the best option for Egypt and for Salah himself.

On the off chance Egypt does reach the final, Salah could be the player to carry them over the line, but given the way the team has performed so far, it seems likely Salah’s quest for an AFCON title is over, for this year at least.