Mohamed Salah is running out of records to beat at club level, as the Egyptian set another Premier League landmark in Liverpool’s hammering of Leeds United.
The 29-year-old scored twice and set up another goal in Wednesday’s 6-0 victory over the Whites, taking him to 160 goal involvements in the English top flight and a new record for an African player.
That figure, comprising 116 goals and 44 assists, means Salah has beaten the previous tally set by former Chelsea and Ivory Coast striker Didier Drogba.
Remarkably Salah, who has been Liverpool’s top goalscorer in each of his four seasons at the club, has achieved this feat in 72 fewer games than Drogba.
Salah is now 27th in the all-time Premier League goal involvement list, but almost halfway to Alan Shearer’s record of 324.
The Liverpool forward leads this season’s scoring charts with 19 league goals – seven more than second-placed team-mate Diogo Jota despite missing two games while on international duty at the Africa Cup of Nations.
Pharaohs captain Salah moved to Anfield in June 2017 and last Saturday he became the 10th player to score 150 goals in all competitions for Liverpool.
He reached that total in just 233 appearances, with only former England World Cup winner Roger Hunt doing so faster than him in the early 1960s.
| Most goal involvements – Africans in Premier League | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Games | Goal involvements | Goals | Assists | |
| Mohamed Salah | 182 | 160 | 116 | 44 |
| Didier Drogba | 254 | 159 | 104 | 55 |
| Sadio Mane | 252 | 143 | 106 | 37 |
| Emmanuel Adebayor | 242 | 133 | 97 | 36 |
| Riyad Mahrez | 245 | 124 | 74 | 50 |
Salah lifted the Premier League title with Liverpool in 2019-20, and the win over Leeds helped the Reds move three points behind league leaders Manchester City as they bid to regain it.
Back in October, Salah overtook Drogba and became the top-scoring African in Premier League history, and fellow Liverpool forward Sadio Mane has also now surpassed the Ivorian.
Mane, 29, also netted twice against Leeds, and the Senegalese moved on to 106 goals – two more than Drogba in two fewer games.
Mane’s Senegal beat Salah’s Egypt in the Nations Cup final earlier this month, and the two players will face each other in March in a two-legged play-off for a place in the 2022 World Cup.
Before that, the pair will aim to add another trophy to Liverpool’s cabinet when they face Chelsea on Sunday in the League Cup final.
However, they are not the only African players setting records in Europe.
Ivory Coast and Ajax’s Sebastien Haller extended his Champions League scoring streak in Wednesday’s last-16 first leg draw at Benfica.
The 27-year-old became the first man to score in his first seven Champions League games, as well as becoming Ajax’s top goal scorer in a single European Cup or Champions League campaign.
Source: BBC
