Liverpool Faces Major Changes After Salah's Departure

Anfield faces a summer of hard truths. The goodbyes have already started.

Andy Robertson, the relentless left-back who embodied so much of Liverpool’s modern edge, has taken his bow. Mohamed Salah, the “Egyptian King” and the defining figure of the club’s attack for seven years, is preparing to walk away with 257 goals behind him and a chasm in front of whoever follows.

This is the squad Arne Slot inherits. Or, as some at Anfield might quietly admit, the squad he has to tear up and rebuild.

A giant hole on the right

Salah’s exit is not just another high-profile departure. It rips out Liverpool’s primary source of goals, their four-time Golden Boot winner, their guarantee of menace on the right flank.

Names are already flying around. Bayern Munich’s Michael Olise. Paris Saint-Germain’s Khvicha Kvaratskhelia. The question is not whether Liverpool admire that calibre of winger. It is whether they can, or will, go all-in now.

John Arne Riise, speaking to GOAL in association with ToonieBet, cut straight to the point. Slot has already hinted at “changes to be done” for next season. Players will leave. Players will arrive. The scale of that operation, though, is tied to a simple reality: Liverpool spent heavily last summer.

“They went big last season, didn’t they? Spent so much money,” Riise said, raising the issue that will hang over every rumour. How much is left? And how much of it will be pushed into a single, marquee forward?

He expects last year’s signings to grow, to go “step by step” and offer more in Slot’s first campaign. But he also knows the obvious: Salah’s output cannot be replaced by optimism alone.

Those big-ticket wide men would be “unbelievable” additions, Riise admitted, yet he questioned whether Liverpool will “spend big trying to find players who really suit the system they need.” That last line matters. Slot’s football is specific. Recruitment now has to be ruthless.

Complacency called out

This is not just about contracts and fees. It is about standards.

Ibrahima Konate is drifting towards free agency. Dominik Szoboszlai, Curtis Jones, Alexis Mac Allister and even Alisson have all found their names dragged into exit talk. The sense of a group at a crossroads is impossible to ignore.

Riise didn’t spare the current squad. Some players, he argued, “have been way off form” and grown “too confident” in their positions. When that happens, the work drops. Performances follow.

You can sack a manager. You can blame a system. Players, Riise insisted, know when they have fallen short.

“There’s some players who need to step up for next season,” he said. That is as much a warning as an observation. Slot will arrive with fresh eyes. Reputations will not protect anyone.

The kid everyone is watching

Amid the uncertainty, one teenager has cut through the gloom.

Rio Ngumoha, still only 17, finished the 2025-26 season with two senior goals and a rising reputation. Some see him as the natural heir to Salah’s right-wing throne, the academy jewel who could soften the blow of losing a legend.

Riise urged caution.

Ngumoha, he believes, must stay at Liverpool. No loan. No year away to grow in someone else’s colours. The priority is a “great pre-season” and a steady climb into the first-team picture.

He will play more next season. He will start more. He will be allowed to stretch his legs for longer spells, to build the fitness and rhythm required at this level. But he is still 17. No teenager’s body, or mentality, is built to churn out 90 minutes every weekend in the Premier League without dips.

“He’s not a starting XI regular yet because he needs time,” Riise said. The expectation is development, not domination. The reality is that Ngumoha “won’t be able to replace Mo Salah as a starter.”

That is not a slight. It is a reminder of the scale of the job.

A summer that will define Slot

So Liverpool stand here: one era closing, another still only sketched in pencil.

Salah is leaving behind more than goals. Robertson’s farewell strips out leadership and bite. Konate’s future hangs in the air. Key midfielders and even the goalkeeper are hearing their names linked with exits. And over all of it, a new head coach must decide who belongs in his Liverpool and who does not.

Riise is “excited to watch this summer” because he knows it cannot be cosmetic. There are “changes to be done, needing to be done.” A stop-gap on the right wing might buy time, but it will not answer the fundamental question.

Liverpool need someone to walk into the space Salah vacates and “do the job that Mo Salah has done.” That is a brutal demand for any signing, let alone a teenager finding his feet.

The rebuild is unavoidable now. The only mystery is how bold Liverpool are prepared to be when the first real Arne Slot squad takes shape.