Mohamed Salah Interested in No. 9 Shirt

Knock on wood, kiss your lucky rabbit’s foot, stroke your lucky summer transfer window beard (guys, is this a thing?), but it looks like the deed is all but done and AS Roma’s Mohamed Salah will be the first successful signing of Liverpool’s summer window.

The deal, which is set to shatter the club’s transfer record, will be a five-year contract for around £39million. The majority of that money will go to Roma, of course, but a chunk of it, £2.7million, will be headed back to Chelsea, who negotiated a 10% sell-on fee with the Italian club when they sold him in 2015.

And here’s another number for you: nine. As in the shirt number that Salah is keen on, according to the Liverpool Echo and other sources. At Roma, the winger wore number 11, but that shirt is already filled by Roberto Firmino, so the number nine shirt is his next preference.

Traditionally, that particular number has gone to a center forward, and Liverpool’s has been sitting empty since Christian Benteke went off to Crystal Palace last summer. Other illustrious players to don that shirt recently are Iago Aspas, Andy Carroll, and Rickie Lambert. So, you know, maybe it wouldn’t hurt to shake things up a bit with that particular, iconic kit number.