The quadruple dream is still well and truly alive for Liverpool which booked its spot in the Champions League final on Wednesday morning.
Few in English football have ever reached this point. All have gone on to fail.
For all the feel-good factor surrounding Liverpool at the moment, history suggests that its own quest to win four top-flight trophies in one season is doomed.
Should this Liverpool side break the barrier, however, it will surely go down as one of the greatest to ever grace club football.
‘REALLY?’ CL fairytale implodes amid all-time horror show as Reds book final
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A third Champions League final in five years is a triumph of mind-boggling proportions in football’s current landscape. The potential to add a second Premier League title in three seasons — it trails Manchester City by only one point with four games remaining — makes this team’s success all the more remarkable.
Liverpool will also play in the FA Cup final against Chelsea on May 15 having already won the League Cup against the same opponents in February.
There is, however, a haunting duality about the position Liverpool now finds itself in.
Three more trophies are still there to be won — but they are also there to lose, completely transforming the mood around the club and its campaign.
Whatever happens of the coming weeks therefore shapes as a defining moment for the core of this group that returned Liverpool to glory.
There is absolutely no suggestion that Liverpool is on the verge of a sudden derailment, and total rebuild. Such an event is surely impossible in Liverpool’s current form under the steely reign of Jurgen Klopp, but there will be an inevitable need for rejuvenation.
That need could be accelerated by the profundity of challenging for multiple titles at this late stage.
These moments ultimately give way to pauses for reflection, conjuring new dreams and reworkings of individual goals and desires.
This is especially true of players who enter the final stages of their contracts, particularly when in their prime money-making windows.
Some of Liverpool’s greatest weapons — era-defining players on which the group was built around — find themselves reaching this exact juncture.
The greatest of which is Mo Salah, Liverpool’s darling whose future at Anfield remains uncertain.
Salah turns 30 next month and is only contracted for one more season. As such, Liverpool could be spooked into selling him this summer to avoid the possibility of losing him for free in the 2023 off-season.
The Egyptian has done nothing to put Liverpool minds at rests either, stalling on lengthy contract negotiations with a big-money switch to Paris Saint Germain said to be an alternative option, should Kylian Mbappe leave, as widely rumoured.
Salah’s personal relationship with Klopp is no small variable in the matter. Klopp is known for his enthusiastic, outward displays of affection to a number of his players after the full time whistle, but Salah is not typically among them.
Salah describes his relationship with Klopp as merely “professional”.
Asked by Marca last year about his relationship with Klopp, Salah offered an emotionally-detached response.
“It’s a normal relationship between two professionals. That’s how I’d describe it,” he said.
He added that “maybe one day” he’d play in Spain.
While Salah is yet to commit to truly building a dynasty on Merseyside, Klopp is all in, inking a new deal last month that will take him to 2026.
Klopp’s long-term recommitment will only fuel doubt around Salah’s own future with the club.
Salah, who leads the Premier League in both goals (22) and assists (13) this season, is well within his prime, but also reaching a point in which most elite players look to secure one last mega contract.
And he’s not the only one.
Fellow star Sadio Mane turned 30 in April and is set to enter the final year of his own deal.
The club is said to be more confident about resigning the Senegalese forward, but he has also been a worrying hold out to this point.
Meanwhile, Roberto Firmino, who will turn 31 in October, and 27-year-old Naby Keita, are also out of contract at the end of next season.
Injuries and new signings have somewhat relegated Firmino to fringe player status, but it was his partnership with Salah and Mane that helped turn the tide at Anfield after years of malaise, with the exception of that season in 2013-14.
With doubt surrounding the future of so many big-name Liverpool players, there’s a feeling that this could be the end of this team as we know it.
That’s not to say it should expect to be any worse, even if the potential departure of Salah-Firmino-Mane would appear to be disastrous on paper.
Liverpool in 2022 — and indeed, the Premier League in general — has the allure to attract the world’s best players, while the sale of its biggest stars would fund the signings of others.
Klopp has a terrific recruitment track record and has shown that even on smaller budgets he can work miracles.
He’s barely missed on any of his recent signings with Diogo Jota playing a major role in 2021-22 with 15 league goals, and Luis Diaz making a seamless introduction in the second half of the season.
The speed in which both Jota and Diaz settled at Anfield has laid the groundwork for continuity within Liverpool’s attacking stocks, while it’s likely Klopp would attract at least one big signing should he be forced to go to market.
Erling Haaland is one name sure to feature prominently in this off-season’s Premier League rumour mill, while Mbappe is said to have been unsettled for some time at Paris Saint Germain.
These matters will soon come into sharper focus but, for now, Liverpool is set to begin what could arguably be the best three-week spell the club has ever experienced.
Conversely, May’s remainder could be filled with nothing but pain.
Regardless of the outcome, there’s a great chance that Liverpool will come out the other side a different team.
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