Salah has been an Africa Cup of Nations runner-up on two occasions, with Egypt suffering defeat against Cameroon in the 2017 final, before losing on penalties to Senegal in the showpiece match in 2021.
Egypt are one of the favourites to win the 2025 edition of the tournament, which gets underway in Morocco on Sunday, December 21. And they will be looking to Salah to fire them to glory.
The Pharaohs are holding a training camp and a warm-up friendly in the second week of December and have the right to call up Salah.
But, according to the Daily Mail, the player will sit down for crunch talks with his country’s manager Hossam Hassan next week to avoid a club-vs-country row as he would prefer to stay with Liverpool that week.
If Salah joins Egypt early and goes on to lift the trophy with his national team, he won’t return to Anfield until the showpiece match has been played on Sunday, January 18.
That means the player could be absent for 10 games across the Premier League, Champions League and FA Cup.
Slot has been reluctant to drop Salah in the league this season, although the 33-year-old was named among the substitutes in two consecutive Champions League matches.
But without Salah in the building, Slot would have no choice but to turn to his other talented attackers. And the former Feyenoord boss could name Alexander Isak and Hugo Ekitike together in his front three, which could be a lethal combination.
Ekitike has been one of the Reds’ most promising attacking players this season, while Isak has proven he can bag plenty of Premier League goals, despite his underwhelming start to life on Merseyside.
The switch up could put Liverpool back in the mix to fight for Premier League honours, depending on their results over the coming weeks, and could be the catalyst for the side to enter their next era centred around that key duo as well as fellow summer signing Florian Wirtz.
Ekitike and Isak are Liverpool’s future. Slot may just need an excuse to make the pair the main men at Anfield earlier than he might have imagined.