Michael Owen makes 'wild' claim on Salah and Mane sabotaging each other

Published on: 05 March 2021

Liverpool legend Michael Owen has sensationally accused Sadio Mane of avoiding winning penalties as he doesn't want team-mate Mohamed Salah to score.

The wild claim came shortly after the champions' horror season took another alarming lurch, with Chelsea having edged to a 1-0 victory and inflicted Liverpool's fifth straight loss at Anfield.

Mane and Salah are both jostling to finish at the club's top-scorer this campaign, although the Egyptian superstar boasts 10 more goals to his name, and Owen believes the competition between them has taken on an unsavoury twist.

The bizarre accusation from former Golden Boot winner Owen centres around Mane not going to ground inside the box in the knowledge that Salah is Liverpool's first-choice spot-kick taker.

And Salah, currently the top-flight's leading scorer, looked set to be handed another golden chance to increase his tally to the season to 18 from 12 yards when Mane burst forwards towards the Chelsea goal.

Andreas Christensen dangled out a clumsy leg, but Mane got to Trent Alexander-Arnold's ball first. There may have been enough contact for the Senegal international to win a penalty, but instead he attempted to meet his heavy touch to score.

'I couldn't believe he didn't go down there and look, I'm not advocating he does,' Owen told Optus Sport.

'It was a great touch and he possibly thought he might get a chance at the end of it , but he did something similar a week ago (against Sheffield United).

'I just wonder, and it might be a little bit of devious thoughts creeping into my head, Mo Salah is the penalty taker in this team, and if he (Mane) thinks he's getting a chance to score he thinks, "well I'm going to score, if I don't stay on my feet, Mo Salah's going to get another penalty."

'These players have been going for the golden boot for the past couple of seasons.

'It might be a wild sort of theory, but the competitive nature of him and Mo Salah... we've seen them not passing to each other when one of them is in a much better position to the other.

'We're seeing a little bit of selfishness, we're seeing a little bit of disgruntled behaviour - Mo Salah shaking his head (when he was subbed off).

'I just think a couple of times there, I've seen Mane go down for those kind of opportunities...and (to not do it) two games on the spin? It just made me think a little bit.'

As referenced by Owen, Mane was involved in a similar incident in Liverpool's clash with Sheffield United last Sunday after Ethan Ampadu's late challenge. Again, however, the forward chose to stay on his feet.

The typically-formidable nature of Liverpool's usual attacking trio has spectacularly faded away this term - and the top-four chasers have now won just three of their last 13 league matches.

They sit in seventh spot, but may tumble even further into ninth with both Tottenham and Aston Villa holding games in hand over them.

Jurgen Klopp's team have gone over 10 hours with scoring at Anfield from open play, and the frustration was evident when the below-par Salah was hauled off around the hour mark against Chelsea.

The talisman was unable to stop himself shaking his head in disbelief as he left the field. His agent took to social media after the change to post a cryptic, and seemingly petulant, message comprised of just a singular full-stop.

Source: m.allfootballapp.com

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