Dejan Lovren Criticizes Salah's Treatment at Liverpool

Dejan Lovren has never been one to pick the easy pass. Not on the pitch, and certainly not with a microphone in front of him.

This time, the former Liverpool defender has stepped firmly into the storm surrounding Mohamed Salah’s departure, tearing into pundits, questioning the club’s leadership and laying a large share of the blame at the feet of former manager Arne Slot.

“It’s disgusting”

Speaking in a candid interview with WinWin, Lovren made no attempt to soften his view of how Salah has been treated after a rare dip in form following a stellar 2024-25 campaign.

"The way they treated him this season is not harsh," he said. "It's disgusting. 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."

For a player whose numbers have defined an era at Anfield, the backlash around his final season stunned his former team‑mate. Lovren’s message was simple: one below-par year should not erase nearly a decade of elite output, nor license what he sees as personal attacks.

Carragher in the firing line

The Croatian then turned his sights on the studio. Jamie Carragher, a Liverpool legend and prominent television pundit, came in for especially sharp criticism after previously accusing Salah of selfishness.

Lovren suggested those barbs said more about the business of television than about Salah’s 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 challenge was direct.

"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."

In Lovren’s eyes, the line between analysis and performance has long since blurred, and Salah has been left on the wrong side of it.

Slot vs Klopp: a broken bond

Lovren did not stop at the media. For him, the roots of Salah’s exit lie inside the club, and specifically in the relationship with Arne Slot.

Beyond the public spat and the visible breakdown in communication, Lovren believes the environment under the Dutchman became impossible for Liverpool’s record Premier League goalscorer, especially when measured against the bond he enjoyed with Jurgen Klopp.

"I don't think it's the management (that pushed Salah to leave)," the current PAOK man 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."

With Klopp, he argued, there was friction at times, but also mutual faith.

"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. 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."

“He never felt that support”

Lovren’s criticism extended up the chain of command. For all the focus on Salah’s form, he believes the club failed in a more basic duty: protecting their star from the noise.

He echoed Salah’s own sense of isolation, painting a picture of a dressing room and leadership structure that left the Egyptian exposed while others slipped out of 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 added. "There was mismanagement; internally, they didn't handle it well. They didn't handle it well."

The repetition underlined his frustration. Problems, he insisted, should have been handled behind closed doors, not played out in headlines with one man as the constant target.

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

Salah has gone, his legacy at Anfield already written in goals and trophies. The question Lovren leaves hanging is not about what he did, but about what Liverpool did around him — and whether the club will learn from the way its modern icon was allowed to walk away under such a cloud.