One thing I can’t quite shake at the minute is how easy the Salah situation could have been to manage if it was headed off early. Not with a big statement, not with a fuss, just with proper squad management and a bit of honesty.

Because when a player’s touch starts getting loose, when the little decisions look half a second late, it doesn’t always mean they’ve suddenly forgotten how to play football. Sometimes it’s fatigue. Sometimes it’s workload. Sometimes it’s just the natural dip you get across a season. Either way, that’s exactly when you earn your money as a manager.

An early chat solves most of this

It wouldn’t have taken much. A quiet word along the lines of: “Mo, you’re carrying a lot. We might be expecting too much from you every three days.” Not accusing him. Not blaming him. Just putting a plan in place that protects the player and helps the team.

And the plan doesn’t need to be complicated. Start him in the bigger games where his presence changes how the opposition defend. Then, around 60 to 70 minutes, get him off. Next match, flip it: start him on the bench, bring him on after 60 as your first tactical change. You keep the edge, you keep the legs fresher, and you keep the threat.

Minutes management is tactics, not punishment

The thing is, managing minutes isn’t “dropping” a player in the dramatic sense. It’s just using the squad properly. Especially when you’re talking about a forward whose game lives on those sharp little moments: the first touch, the burst over five yards, the ability to attack the box again and again.

If you leave it until it’s glaring, you end up with a situation instead of a solution. That’s where it starts to feel like the manager’s buried his head until it’s impossible to ignore, and now everyone’s reading into everything.

We’ve seen the spark is still there

What makes it more frustrating is that you can still see Salah has that spring when the game state changes. Give him space, give him a moment, and suddenly he looks alive again. That tells you plenty: it’s not that the player’s finished, it’s that the load needs managing better so those moments come more often.

Salah’s an adult, a top professional. He’d understand being used smartly if it’s explained properly. Truth is, this is the sort of thing that should be handled before it becomes a talking point at all.

Written by Chrisymate: 6 January 2026

Tags: tactics