During his time at Liverpool, Mohamed Salah has played a variety of roles under Jurgen Klopp.
He arrived from Rome as a winger and was moulded into an inside forward by the Liverpool boss as a means of introducing more goals to his game. The change worked, and Salah scored a record 32 Premier League goals in his debut season in Merseyside.
This season, his role has been altered further, as he's played a large number of matches as the team's central striker in a 4-2-3-1 formation. Again though, the change to his game appears to have worked, as it's now February and the attacker is again top of the scoring charts with 16.
Regardless of which role he's excelled in most, the Egyptian has unquestionably been successful to a high standard in both. The reason for this stems from his versatility and ultimately, his elite footballing level.
Salah's attacking output is rivalled by very few, and it's emphasised further when focusing on his underlying numbers. In areas such as touches in the box, Expected Goals (xG), key passes, shots and dribbles to name but a few, Salah excels and it's largely because of his underlying output that Liverpool initially invested in his talent.
The consistent productivity of Liverpool's no.11 since arriving at the club rivals the world's best attackers. As a result, he's become a player that's simply too good to not be central to his team's offensive play.
The future development
Liverpool are rumoured to be searching for a top-class striker to add to the squad in the summer, given the uncertain futures of Daniel Sturridge and Divock Origi. The most prominent name linked is Timo Werner, who's currently at RB Leipzig in Germany. Interestingly though, Werner is very similar to Salah in terms of playing style and attacking output.
Both players are short, fast and well built, and both have strong underlying numbers when it comes to penalty box efficiency, with the only real difference being Salah's impressive creativity levels.
If Werner or a striker with a similar profile was signed, it would permit Klopp to experiment with Salah further from goal, with the added assurance that a scoring threat is still being provided by the striker that's been purchased.
In a recent league match against Brighton, supporters may have witnessed an early insight into that very prospect, as shown below.
Salah initially started the match in one of his customary roles, by leading the line in the first half as the team's lone striker. In the second half though, it became apparent that Liverpool's key man simply wasn't involved enough, largely due to Brighton's defensive positioning.
Chris Hughton's side clogged the space in the final third, in an attempt to stifle the African player of the year and to nullify Liverpool's attack - an approach implemented by numerous opposing teams. To counteract this though, Klopp instructed Salah to come deeper than ever before to influence the proceedings, again shown below, just one minute later.
Once collecting the ball in these areas, often with just two or three team-mates deeper than him, Salah had time and space to turn and face the opposing team.
Once doing so, his role became similar to that fulfilled by the likes of Lionel Messi, Eden Hazard and Neymar. These players are indispensable for their respective teams, and they're able to use their ability, forward-thinking intent and link-up play to progress the ball up the field seamlessly.
Messi, for example, initially started on the right flank as Salah did, before being moved into an advanced central position under Pep Guardiola - similar to Salah this season. Gradually though, Messi's position has become more withdrawn, with him still scoring regularly but while also being able to influence build-up play in deeper areas.
In the example below, Salah picked the ball up near the halfway line, and instead of simply making a pass, he opted to face up his opponent and drive forward with the ball through Brighton's defensive block.
Salah then made a pass to Roberto Firmino, who had found space as a result of Salah attracting attention, shown below.
Once Firmino controlled the ball, as shown below, he made a pass wide to Trent Alexander-Arnold, who crossed into the box in the direction of Salah. The £36.9million had continued his running after initially receiving the ball near the halfway line, and almost got on the end of Alexander-Arnold's cross as a result.
In this instance, Salah's dynamic ability with the ball as well as his offensive nature allowed his team to progress up the field very quickly and create a scoring chance.
Another relevant example is provided below, taken from the final quarter of the match. In this image, Salah again retrieves the ball in a withdrawn area, with just four team-mates deeper than him, and turns to face his opponent.
This time though, instead of driving with the ball, Salah plays an incisive pass through two Brighton midfielders into the feet of Firmino.
Then, as shown below, Salah once again continued his running and made a darting run through to support the Brazilian, who this time opted to shoot from the edge of the area.
Other similar situations occurred frequently throughout the course of the second half, with Salah making more passes into the final third (6) than in any other previous match this season (per Wyscout).
His positional heat map for the second half, pictured below, is further evidence of his much deeper role.
Overall, it remains to be seen whether the role change during the match was an insight into future developments.
However, Salah's performance in that second half, as well as his evident comfortability when adapting to changes in position, indicate that it's certainly a possibility.
The introduction of a clinical penalty box striker in the summer would facilitate such an alteration for Klopp to make - and he should take inspiration from the development of Messi's career path, who's arguably considered as the greatest ever.
Salah may well become Liverpool's Messi.