Dejan Lovren Defends Mohamed Salah Amid Criticism

Dejan Lovren has launched a fierce defence of Mohamed Salah, accusing critics and club figures of crossing a line in their treatment of the Liverpool great during his final season at Anfield.

The Croatian, a close friend and former team-mate of Salah, believes the discourse around the Egyptian’s dip in form after a stellar 2024-25 campaign went far beyond football analysis and into something far more personal.

“The way they treated him this season is not harsh. It's disgusting,” Lovren told WinWin, stunned by the tone that followed Salah’s every performance and every expression. For almost a decade, Salah has been the face of Liverpool’s modern era. One poor season, Lovren argued, and he became an easy target.

“Why didn't they talk about him like this for the past eight or nine years? Tell me... OK, one season, and then he's the target again. There are so many other issues.”

Lovren takes aim at Carragher

Lovren’s frustration did not stop at the general noise. He went straight for one of the club’s most prominent voices.

Jamie Carragher has been one of the more outspoken pundits on Salah, questioning his mentality and accusing him of selfishness. Lovren, who shared a dressing room with both men, suggested those comments owed more to television theatre than serious tactical insight.

He's convinced some pundits are playing to the cameras, not the game.

“He's being really heavily criticised. Some pundits do it just to attract attention, maybe because they haven't succeeded in other areas of their lives, so now they need to perform well... especially Carragher, he says whatever he wants,” Lovren said.

The former centre-back then issued a challenge.

“I always said he should tell him this to his face, say all these things to Mo to his face. He'll never say that. Because I know he never will, because he never said it to me. He's talked badly about me too, but he never said that to me anyway. You know, he's just performing on TV and he gets paid for it, so he needs to perform this way.”

The implication is clear: the Salah debate, in Lovren’s eyes, has become a show. And the man at the centre of it is the one paying the price.

Finger pointed at Slot

Lovren did not stop at the media. He went straight into the heart of the club’s recent upheaval.

For him, Salah’s decision to walk away from Merseyside cannot be pinned on “the club” in a broad sense. It comes down, he insists, to one relationship that broke beyond repair: the one with Arne Slot.

“I don't think it's the management (that pushed Salah to leave),” the PAOK defender said. “I think it's just one person, and I think it's just the manager. They didn't have a good relationship. Let's put it simply.”

Under Jurgen Klopp, Salah thrived in an environment built on trust and mutual belief. Lovren painted a picture of a bond that was not flawless, but strong enough to carry both player and manager through difficult spells.

“With Klopp, he had a really good relationship. It wasn't always perfect, but they knew each other very well, let's say that too, and they trusted each other, they liked each other, and Mo gave everything on the pitch for Klopp, and Klopp gave him that trust.”

Then came the contrast.

“But (with Slot) it was the opposite. It's that simple, and everyone knows it because when you look at the previous eight or nine seasons, he did really well.”

In Lovren’s telling, Salah did not suddenly forget how to play football. The environment changed. The trust evaporated. The club’s all-time Premier League record scorer, once the symbol of Klopp’s Liverpool, found himself out of sync with the new regime.

“He never felt that support”

Behind the headlines and the punditry, Lovren believes there was a deeper failure at Anfield: a failure to protect their biggest star when he needed it most.

He echoed Salah’s own complaints about feeling exposed, left alone to absorb the criticism while others escaped the spotlight.

“There are other players who should also take responsibility and say, 'yes, this is my fault', but you know, some players never came forward,” Lovren said.

“There was mismanagement; internally, they didn't handle it well. They didn't handle it well. Even if you have some problems, you have to talk about it in the dressing room, and like I said, Mo never felt that support.”

Instead, Salah remained the easy headline.

“He was always the front-page headline, 'Ah, it's Mohamed Salah, don't be surprised.' I mean... it's a deep-seated issue.”

Lovren’s words cut through the usual end-of-era platitudes. This is not the soft-focus farewell of a legend gently fading away. It is a parting shot at how one of Liverpool’s greatest players has been treated in his final act.

The goals, the trophies, the records will live in the club’s history. The question Lovren leaves hanging is harsher: when the storm hit, who really stood next to Mohamed Salah?