Former Liverpool midfielder Danny Murphy believes Mo Salah needs to be told a few home truths about his form at the start of the season.

The Egyptian international has not looked himself in recent games and Murphy believes the 30-year-old should be called out for underperforming:

“Salah needs a kick. It’s nothing to do with the contract he signed but sometimes you need it, when you’ve scored that many goals and do what he’s done sometimes you just need upstairs to say ‘come on.’ If it means digging someone out in front of the rest of the lads, I’ve seen it before, the best midfielder Liverpool have ever had in history [Steven Gerrard]. I remember seeing at half time in a Champions League game being told to get a shower, nobody saw that coming!”

Murphy also went on to criticise Virgil van Dijk and Trent Alexander-Arnold for being complacent, with both players performing poorly:

“When I talk about complacency I aim it at him [Van Dijk] a lot, as well as Trent Alexander-Arnold and some of the other lads but I think he’s guilty of it. There’s a little bit of lethargy about his play, like he’s playing in third gear. He looks like he’s playing protecting an injury, I don’t think he is but that’s the way it looks.”

While the poor form of certain individuals cannot be disputed, Murphy is failing to account for a number of other factors.

FIFTEEN separate players have picked up injuries this season already, and that hardly allows for a settled team. With members of the first-team slowly returning to fitness, improvements on the pitch should follow.

You also have to consider the psychological factor. The Reds lost the Premier League title by one point and they were also on the losing side in a Champions League final. It can take some time to get over these setbacks so it’s not surprising some of the players mentioned by Murphy are not firing on all cylinders.