When A God Wears #11
There will never be anyone like Mo Salah.
The dumbest thing about being a soccer fan, and the best thing, is that the actual point of the sport is so goddamn hard. How they determine who wins--y'know, who scores the most fucking goals– is a task that's hardly guaranteed to happen at all. There's a reason everyone loses their shit when the ball hits the net. We didn't know for sure it ever would! It's why we all reflexively put our hands on our head or cover our face or put a fist through they drywall when a good chance goes begging. It was hard enough to get here, asshole! We don't know when the next chance is coming, if it's coming! You can't waste this!
You feel your team scoring a goal. Every time. It's a physical sensation. A charge from head to toe. I'd say you could fly at that very moment, but chances are you have, because someone you didn't know has picked you up and quite possibly hurled you across the bar. That feeling, that we're never guaranteed, is intoxicating. It's why we do it.
Which is why there's something mystical about players who can score regularly. The whole sport is built on the idea that it's really hard to get into the positions to score, get the ball in those positions, and then have the nerve, clarity, and swag to put the ball between the posts. Everything in soccer is positioned to keep anyone from doing that. There's 11 other guys who don't have to do anything other than get in the way to keep an opponent from scoring. One of those guys gets to use his hands! You have to keep moving, and control a moving, spinning orb with parts of your body that aren't designed to control things. And you'll have maybe a second or two to put it all together. That's after you've either had to help work that fucking thing all the way up the field, or waited for your teammates to do so.
Guys who overcome all of this just once every two games are stars. They have the most jerseys in the stands. They probably make the most money. They get advertising campaigns. They get murals outside the stadium. And they'll still miss, a lot. It's not a sure thing when they get the ball. It's a good bet, but it's not an automatic cash.
There are a few lucky fans and teams, who for only a brief moment on the timeline, and one that will always feel too short, have a "Oh that's a goal" guy. They get the ball, anywhere near the penalty area, and they get an angle, or a foot of space, or make a move and have a look, and you say to yourself, "Goal." No dice roll. No odds. No uncertainty. It's just a goal.
There are only a few players like that. They don't just have mystique. It's hard to feel as close to them as you might think, because they don't seem of this world, of this species. They are bestowed upon us. Even on the field with 21 of the best in the world, they seem different. There's an forcefield around them. In a sport that is meant to never be bent in a way it doesn't want to, these are the ones that can bend games, seasons, entire clubs to their will. They don't just rise above it from time to time. They live there.
That was Mo Salah.
The only thing I can say about Mo that would come close to being definitive is that upon his arrival, everything was possible for Liverpool. 42 goals in the league and Europe that first season. That was a number that we couldn't understand, didn't make sense, as he dragged a rather unimpressive Liverpool team to a Champions League final.
At first, everyone's sure it's just a heater. A good player getting some fortune and everything will go in for a month, maybe two. But he just kept scoring. It was a summer storm. Every time he was put through, or the ball found him in the box, or he got a fullback isolated...goal. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200. Goal. It didn't stop for eight seasons. Eight seasons of glory, salvation, assuredness. Don't worry, Mo will score.
There is an awesome power to watching someone take the biggest question in the sport, in just about any sport, "Can he finish it?" and turn it into a joke. "Oh he'll score." It's the antithesis of everything soccer is.
"Unplayable" is about the highest compliment any player can get. The idea that there's no plan, no opponent, no force that can keep a player from doing what he wants, when he wants. That it's ordained, of just a different power. Whether he was sprinting past people with legs that looked almost cartoonish, or weaving those patterns and moves with Mane and Firmino, it was watching something different. Something unknowable, that we weren't actually meant to get a glimpse of but it had escaped from whatever crypt it was kept.
His crowning achievement will always be last season. I will always argue that it was the best in the world, he was the best in the world, and 29 goals and 18 assists is the best individual season the Premier League has ever seen. Every week, Mo would open up the game, shape it in the palm of his hand, mold it to whatever he felt like, and set it back down how he saw fit. Super Bowls can be won by quarterbacks on their own. Goalies can take teams to Cups. Stars claim the Larry O'Brien trophy. But Premier League titles aren't supposed to be won by one guy. Salah did it.
I only got to see Mo live once. It was November '24. 2-0 over Villa. He scored the second. He got a lucky bounce to start, as a clearance at the halfway line was crashed right into his chest. But once he was away, there was never a thought anyone could catch him. That was the thing about Mo. Once he got clear, even with the burden of having to take the ball with him, no one could ever catch him. No one ever thought anyone would catch him. Once he got into the area, it felt like Emi Martinez was just filling out a scripted role, to appear to be trying to stop him. And he was one of the best keepers in the world, yet no one in that stadium thought he had a prayer of stopping Mo from scoring. Even Martinez:
https://youtu.be/1sFLfFCnGgk?si=wW4PLuwcjLmtMQgx&t=96
"Oh, that's a goal." You never get to say that as a fan. There's always doubt, right up until it crosses the line. It's never sure. Unless you're blessed to have a Salah in your team. It's a glimpse of something more, something unreachable. Thanks for taking us there, Mo.