‘It’s the Olympic Games… We had to play already without Mo’: Jurgen Klopp suggests Salah COULD play for Egypt in Tokyo… but he has had ‘no contact’ from the coaches who want the Anfield star to lead gold medal charge
- Egypt are considering selecting Mohamed Salah for Tokyo 2020 Olympics
- As Olympics is not FIFA tournament Liverpool must give consent for him to play
- Tournament is between July 22 and August 8 so Salah would miss start of season
- Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp insisted no decision had yet been taken on it
Jurgen Klopp has called for more information before making a final decision on whether he will allow Mohamed Salah to play for Egypt at Tokyo 2020 this summer.
The Pharaohs will appear in the Olympic Games football tournament for the first time since London 2012 after winning the 2019 Africa U23 Cup of Nations for the first time and Salah is slated to be named as one of three overage players in the squad.
However, with the tournament running from July 22 until August 8, the winger will then miss the start of the Premier League season and as a non-FIFA competition Salah must receive permission from his club to compete.
Mohamed Salah may appear for Egypt at the Olympic Games in Tokyo this summer
On the current situation, Klopp said: ‘No decision. Do I want to lose a player in pre-season? Of course not, but we have to consider different things and I will speak to Mo and we are completely clear about what we want but we need more information – how would it look, when would preparation start and all that stuff.
‘Nobody has been in contact, so far it is just in the media.
‘It’s difficult to get in contact with me using the newspapers over there because most of the things I don’t read but Matt (McCann, head of press) informs me.
Jurgen Klopp insisted that he is yet to decide whether to let Salah participate in the event
‘No decision made yet, but we will see.
‘We had to play already without Mo, not too often thank God but time to time we have to and we will have so that is how it is and it is not about that.
‘It’s the Olympic Games, Olympia is Olympia, I am a sportsperson myself, so we will have to see how we deal with it.
‘We cannot discuss it really because we don’t know a lot about it, but we heard about the things they said. They have to contact us then we will see.’