Anfield and Salah are a perfect match – but Liverpool could cope without their hero

The immediate thought is that it cannot happen. Mohamed Salah, the embodiment of this glorious period of Liverpool’s history, cannot be allowed to leave: the club have to give him whatever he wants. Just make sure he stays, keeps rattling along at 20-odd goals a season, many of which will be stunning, keeps delighting both fans and neutrals with his verve and imagination.

But the immediate thought may not be entirely helpful: no player is ever irreplaceable. Of course, there is a sentimental appeal to the idea that a player and a club have a special relationship, particularly when that player has been instrumental in a club’s rise, as Salah has been for Liverpool under Jürgen Klopp. But circumstances change. Liverpool’s history is a study in the importance of not becoming unduly attached to heroes, of moving players on at the right time.

By his own admission, Bill Shankly allowed his first great Liverpool team to grow old together, until the FA Cup defeat to Watford in 1970 shocked him into action. His successor, Bob Paisley, quieter but far more ruthless, never made the same mistake. When Kevin Keegan decided to escape the UK’s upper-rate income tax of 83% in 1977, Liverpool signed Kenny Dalglish.

The key to long-term management is to an extent knowing when to offload players – which is one of the reasons football can be such a brutal, apparently ungrateful, sport.

Similarly, Alex Ferguson never let players outstay their usefulness: he culled Mark Hughes, Andrei Kanchelskis and Paul Ince in 1995 and was just as swift to release Roy Keane a decade later. Even the very greatest can outstay their welcome. For all the wailing and hand-wringing when Lionel Messi left Barcelona, recent evidence is that a reset was long