Wayne Rooney Urges Arne Slot to Exclude Mohamed Salah from Final Game
Wayne Rooney has called on Arne Slot to take a hard line with Mohamed Salah and leave the Liverpool forward out of the club’s final game of the season against Brentford, insisting the Egyptian has “publicly disrespected” his manager once too often.
Speaking on The Wayne Rooney Show, the Manchester United great did not hide his frustration at Salah’s latest public outburst, after the Liverpool star used social media to demand a return to the “heavy metal” style of football associated with Jurgen Klopp – a message widely seen as a swipe at Slot’s current approach.
“I find it sad at the end of what he’s done and what he’s achieved at Liverpool,” Rooney said. “It’s not the point for him to come out and aim another dig at Slot. He wants to play heavy metal football, so he’s basically saying he wants Jurgen Klopp football. Now I don’t think Mo Salah can cope with that type of football anymore. I think his legs have gone to play at that high tempo and high intensity.”
For Rooney, this was not just a nostalgic plea from a club legend. It was a grenade lobbed into a dressing room that still has to live with Slot next season.
“He's almost just dropped the grenade and said he doesn't trust and believe in Arne Slot and almost thrown his teammates who are going to be there next season and let them have to deal with that as well and put them into a position,” Rooney argued.
This is not the first flashpoint between Salah and his manager. Earlier in the campaign, the forward was dropped after accusing Slot and the club of throwing him “under the bus” over his lack of regular starts. That episode simmered. This one has boiled.
Salah’s status at Anfield remains untouchable in historical terms. One of the greatest to wear the shirt, a scorer of 257 goals, a symbol of the Klopp era. Yet the numbers this season tell a harsher story. After firing Liverpool to the Premier League title last year with 29 league goals, he has just 12 in 40 appearances across all competitions as the team stumbles towards a likely fifth-place finish.
Rooney believes the public comments are not a coincidence.
“I think Salah's trying to vindicate himself and make himself feel better because he's had a very poor season,” he said. “So I think he's been very selfish in what he's done in the two occasions. It's a shame and fans will be on his side, but I think when you look deeper into it and having been in a dressing room in a similar situation to that as well, Mo Salah knows exactly what he's doing.”
The former England captain knows what a power struggle with a giant of the game looks like. He lived it. Drawing on his own battles with Sir Alex Ferguson, Rooney pointed to the day he was left out of the legendary manager’s final match at Old Trafford after a disagreement. For him, that is the blueprint.
“If I was Arne Slot, I’d have him nowhere near the stadium in the last game,” Rooney said. “I had it with Alex Ferguson. I had a disagreement and fall out and at Alex Ferguson’s last game at Old Trafford, he left me out of the squad for that reason. That’s your manager. You can’t publicly disrespect him twice the way he has and get away with it.
“And that’s where if I was Arne Slot, I’d have to pull rank and just say, listen, you’re not coming anywhere near the place on Saturday, whether you like it or not. I really doubt he will do it, but I think he should.”
The question of Salah’s farewell looms large. Anfield would ordinarily be preparing a hero’s send-off for one of its modern icons. Rooney is not convinced the script should run that smoothly.
“Of course he deserves a good send off but does he deserve it just for this? It’s the second time he’s done it,” he said. “It’s just a shame to see one of the great icon of Premier League players leave the Premier League probably in this situation.”
All of this plays out against a broader Liverpool slump. A title defence that once looked robust has crumbled. The intensity that defined the Klopp years has drained from the pitch, and with it, Rooney says, the fear factor of Anfield itself.
“I think that's the biggest change for me where you go to Anfield, the first thing you want to do is quieten the crowd. But I think actually by Liverpool not pressing they're quietening the crowd down themselves and frustrating the Liverpool fans,” he said. “And so that's the big, big change for me.”
The crowd grows restless, the press has softened, and the team that suffocated opponents now feels strangely passive. Rooney even suggested that some players have “downed tools” during this grim stretch, a damning accusation at a club that once prided itself on relentless effort.
“I’m quite split in should he go or should he stay because he won the league last season, I think he deserves a bit more time, in terms of what we’ve seen this season,” Rooney admitted. “I don't feel right or good saying this, some players look like they've downed tools and that's a big problem if you see that or you feel that for the manager.”
So Slot stands at a crossroads. On one side, a legendary forward whose legacy is secure but whose influence now feels combustible. On the other, a manager fighting to establish authority in a dressing room that has known only one voice for years.
Rooney’s message is blunt: make a stand now, even if it means banishing one of the club’s greatest ever players from his final act. The next chapter at Anfield may depend on whether Slot is willing to do it.
