Liverpool's Summer Challenges: Replacing Salah and Squad Changes

Anfield faces a summer of goodbyes and hard questions. The banners and songs will be for the legends walking out of the Shankly Gates, but the real work starts the moment the emotion fades and the recruitment meetings begin.

Arne Slot, or whoever ultimately leads Liverpool into the post-Jurgen Klopp era, inherits a squad about to be stripped of some of its most decorated figures. Andy Robertson, the relentless left-back who embodied the club’s modern resurgence, is on his way. Mohamed Salah, the “Egyptian King” and author of 257 Liverpool goals, is preparing for a new challenge away from Merseyside. Ibrahima Konate is heading towards free agency. Around them, uncertainty swirls.

Dominik Szoboszlai, Curtis Jones, Alexis Mac Allister – all have been dragged into exit talk. Even Alisson, the Brazilian goalkeeper who has bailed Liverpool out time and again, has not been immune to speculation. This is no gentle refresh. This is surgery.

And Salah’s departure cuts deepest.

Replacing that volume of goals and that level of influence is not a normal recruitment puzzle. It’s a structural question for the entire attack. Do Liverpool gamble on a ready-made star to walk into that right flank and carry the weight of a four-time Golden Boot winner? Or do they accept a short-term compromise and wait for the perfect target in a future window?

Names such as Bayern Munich’s Michael Olise and Paris Saint-Germain’s Khvicha Kvaratskhelia have been floated as long-term answers. The temptation is obvious. But the reality of Liverpool’s budget and timing is less clear.

John Arne Riise, speaking exclusively to GOAL in association with ToonieBet, framed the challenge bluntly. Slot has already hinted that “some changes” are coming. Players will leave. Players will arrive. The question is how aggressively Liverpool can move after last summer’s heavy outlay.

“They went big last season, didn't they? Spent so much money,” Riise pointed out, underlining a dilemma that hangs over this window. How much is left to spend at the top end of the market? Can they truly go toe-to-toe for the elite wide forwards they admire, or will they have to edge forward step by step and trust that last summer’s signings kick on?

The pressure on recruitment is sharpened by what Riise sees as underperformance inside the current squad. Some players, in his view, have coasted.

He believes a few became too comfortable in their roles, stopped putting in the work required, and saw their standards drop. When that happens at a club like Liverpool, the manager tends to carry the blame, but Riise was clear: the dressing room must own its part. Certain players, he argued, “need to step up for next season.”

Amid the uncertainty, one bright spark has lit up the conversation: Rio Ngumoha.

At 17, the teenage forward has already scored twice for the senior side, one of the very few Liverpool players to emerge from the 2025-26 campaign with his reputation enhanced. His fearlessness has inevitably led to a big question: could he be the one to help soften the blow of Salah’s exit?

The idea is romantic. The reality, Riise insists, must be managed.

He believes Ngumoha should stay at Liverpool rather than head out on loan, and that next season must start with a strong pre-season, not with pressure to become the new Salah. More starts will come. More minutes too. But the Norwegian is adamant that a teenager’s body cannot handle the grind of playing every week at the sharp end of the Premier League, nor should he be expected to deliver consistent, top-level performances at such a young age.

There will be ups and downs. That is normal. That is development.

For Riise, Ngumoha is not yet a nailed-on starter, but he should be a growing presence – a player who starts “a lot more games” and plays longer spells to build his fitness and rhythm. What he cannot be, at least not yet, is the direct heir to Salah.

Liverpool, Riise stressed, “need someone else to come in and fill that role and do the job that Mo Salah has done.” That is the crux of the summer. A 17-year-old prodigy can be part of the solution. He cannot be the plan.

So the club stands at a fork in the road. One path leads to a bold, expensive statement on the right wing. The other leans on patience, internal growth and the hope that this evolving squad can find new leaders from within.

The farewells are already written. What comes next will define whether this is a gentle transition or the start of something far more turbulent at Anfield.