Liverpool FC position as Man City's closest rivals is facing a serious problem

Liverpool are the only team that can live with Manchester City in the Premier League right now. And the closeness of that rivalry seems to indicate that they could become the English equivalent of Barcelona and Real Madrid in the noughties - two heavyweights slugging it out for domestic and European honours with everyone else operating around the fringes.

But Jurgen Klopp’s words about Mohamed Salah on Friday must be worrying for fans of the Merseyside outfit, and serve as a reminder of one aspect in which the Blues have consistently outperformed Liverpool in the last eight years. Klopp seemed to hint that Salah is holding off signing a new contract until he sees evidence that the Merseysiders share his ambitions - in other words, he wants them in the market for big names.

“Mo expects this club to be ambitious,” said the Liverpool boss.” We cannot do much more. It is Mo's decision. It is all fine from my point of view. Nothing happened further, no signing or rejection. We just have to wait, there's no rush.”

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City are already expressing the kind of ambition that Salah wants to see, by signing Jack Grealish last summer, trying to land Harry Kane and now leading the chase for Borussia Dortmund ace Erling Haaland. City should only get stronger in the coming years, as they remain competitive in the market but also see their fairly young squad mature and bind even further - and Salah knows it.

More importantly, City are ensuring they remain competitive for the foreseeable future by signing up their best players on long-term contracts. They have Ederson, John Stones, Ruben Dias, Aymeric Laporte, Joao Cancelo, Kevin De Bruyne, Bernardo Silva, Cole Palmer and Jack Grealish all