UFC star Paddy Pimblett on Liverpool’s Mohamed Salah saga: ‘He shouldn’t have done it but...’ | OneFootball

UFC star Paddy Pimblett has weighed in – not for a fight, but on the saga gripping his beloved Liverpool FC.

“Paddy The Baddy” will fight for the UFC interim lightweight title in January, facing Justin Gaethje in the main event of UFC 324 in Las Vegas. But his mind has also been close to home in recent weeks, with Mohamed Salah’s future at Liverpool FC up in the air.

Salah, one of Liverpool’s top all-time goal scorers and a two-time Premier League champion at Anfield, recently said he felt “thrown under the bus” by the club, as manager Arne Slot dropped the Egypt forward in a bid to reverse the team’s poor form.

It could be that Salah leaves Liverpool in the January transfer window, although he seemed well connected to fans on an emotional day at Anfield last weekend.

“It’s not up to me, you know what I mean? We’d really like him to stay, of course,” Pimblett told The Independent on Wednesday. “We want him to stay and break more records with us. But he shouldn’t have done what he done.

“I think he’s given Slot more power by doing what he’s done; he shouldn’t have come out and done that. He made the club look silly, he made himself look silly, made Slot look silly, made everyone look silly.

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Paddy Pimblett after his win over Michael Chandler in April (Getty Images)

“And then it’s one of them, lad... I hope he stays, obviously, and I hope he comes back and is the player he was in the first half of last season – in the second half of this season – but if the club decide to cash in on him and sell him to Saudi in January, and bring like a[n Antoine] Semenyo in, I don’t think anyone would be complaining.

“You’ve got to see it from both sides. If the club think they can sell him, get a fee for him, get £400,000 a week off the wage bill, sign Semenyo and Marc Guehi, that’s good business.

“It just depends what the club wants to do. I have full faith in Liverpool Football Club and what they want to do, lad, I’m an eternal optimist. I’m thinking right now: it’s only Arsenal [atop the league], it’s only 10 points [to Liverpool].

“Arsenal could drop that at any time. I’m more concerned about [Manchester] City; City are the team, City are gonna win the league if it’s not us, because Arsenal aren’t.”

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Mohamed Salah (left) and Liverpool coach Arne Slot (PA Wire)

Salah came off the bench in the first half on Saturday, replacing the injured Joe Gomez, as Liverpool secured a 2-0 home win over Brighton.

With that, they secured a fifth win in their last 10 games, although that spell has also seen them draw twice and lose on three occasions – with all three defeats coming by a margin of three goals.

This form has marked the continuation of a severely underwhelming run for Slot’s side, who won the Premier League last season but sit seventh in the domestic table and ninth in the Champions League.