The current expectation is that next season Salah will wear
the 11
shirt while Firmino will switch to the nine.
Despite early reports that
Mohamed Salah would take the number nine shirt at Liverpool, the expectation now is that Roberto Firmino has
instead chosen to take on the number nine, freeing up the 11 for Salah. The
move will allow Salah to stay with the number he wore at Roma.
It’s not a move done entirely for Salah’s sake, as though the
Egyptian international’s first choice was always likely to be 11, the player
was reportedly happy to wear the nine. Instead, it’s at least as much about
Firmino’s decision to embrace his role as Jürgen Klopp’s first choice striker.
Firmino arrived at the club having mostly played in supporting
attacking positions—on the wing or as a second striker off a more traditional
centre forward—but last season under Klopp used showed his value for setting
the press as the fulcrum point in a false nine, 4-3-3 system.
The arrival of Salah, a goalscoring winger, seemed designed to
allow Klopp to continue with a system that used Firmino as its first choice
striker. It’s also worth noting Daniel Sturridge’s late season renaissance was
based on the striker showing an increased willingness to press and drop deep.
All signs, then, point to a 4-3-3 that deploys a false nine—or a
striker whose job is to set the press and regularly drop deep to link play at
least as much as it is to score goals. It’s the role Firmino is best suited
for, and he will now take on the traditional striker’s number nine to go with
it.
Salah, meanwhile, gets his favoured 11, and everybody wins. At
least aside from the fans still clamouring for the club to buy a big money
striker this summer, something Firmino’s embrace of the nine seems to make even
less likely today than it already appeared given Klopp’s transfer wish list.
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