Chelsea and Liverpool lock horns on Sunday at the Stamford Bridge with the Blues boss wary of the threat posed by the Egyptian forward.
Liverpool’s Mo Salah returns to Stamford Bridge on Sunday to face a team he once played for and a manager who was at one point his teammate with the sole aim of helping the league leaders maintain their five-point cushion on the rest of the division.
Salah spent only a year and a half in London before leaving for Roma initially on loan before the move was made permanent by the Italians. The Egyptian was just 22 at the time and had only played 19 matches as a Blue.
In Italy, the forward blossomed and has since returned to England where he has proven himself to be a world-class performer.
Lampard however is quickly gaining a reputation as one who will give young players a chance if he sees the talent there, leading the question to be asked of him whether Salah would have established himself at Chelsea had he been coming through in the current age, reports Soccernet.ng.
‘It is hard to answer because you can never directly compare players from a different generation or era,’ Lampard begins.
‘It is hard because everyone has their own pathways.
‘Unfortunately for Mo it did not work out here but great credit to him, he went to Italy and then came back and now he is a superstar. That is his path and it is hard to compare with what might have been in different circumstances.
‘The talent was obviously there but at that time we had a lot of options in attacking areas – wingers, no.10s and striker-type players and he did not get many opportunities for whatever reason. To become the player who came back to Liverpool, that is where huge credit is due and you don’t have to go searching any further than Mo himself for that, to say what professionalism, what work ethic.
‘To leave a club like Chelsea is not easy because people will then cast you aside as you did not make it here. To go and prove himself and be the superstar he is now is complete credit to Mo himself.’
