Mohamed Salah shows Egypt exactly what they will be missing if he leaves them behind after World Cup 2018

Like Lionel Messi, Salah struggled to cope with the weight of so much expectation. And yet even though he was half-fit and saddled with off-field distractions, he was Egypt’s best player

How to assess this most disappointing of World Cups for Mohamed Salah?

On the one hand it was an abject failure, for both the Egyptian national team and possibly the man himself. Egypt arrived in Russia with high expectations of sealing a place in the knockout stages for the very first time, drawn in an apparently unthreatening group alongside two nations sat lower than them in the Fifa world rankings. Instead they leave with zero points and rock bottom of their group, still waiting for their first ever World Cup win after equally unsuccessful appearances in 1934 and 1990.

On the other, he did as well as could be expected for an injured talisman struggling to carry an entire nation’s weight of expectation on only one fit shoulder. Salah arrived in Russia half-fit with a distant dream. He was unable to play in Egypt’s opening game, probably shouldn’t have played in their second – and yet was still responsible for the nation’s best two moments in a disappointing three games, not to mention both of the goals that they managed.

His early goal against Saudi Arabia so neatly encapsulated just how vital he is to this lopsided team. Salah was the only player in a white shirt with the presence of mind to hare forward when Abdallah Said drove the ball downfield: he was the only player on the pitch with the necessary skill to pluck it out the air first-time, deftly avoiding the rapidly approaching Haswani brothers and collecting himself in front of goal.

What happened next was pure Salah: total composure under pressure and the kind of instinctive, predatory finish that we have come to associate with the man. His first touch was skilful, his second sublime: a perfectly weighted lob hit while running at full tilt and fully expecting contact (on his left shoulder, no less), the ball arching over Yasser Al-Mosailem and bouncing into the net.

Although that finish only tells half of the story. For less than two minutes later he was put through on goal once again, only this time chipping the ball harmlessly beyond Al-Mosailem’s crossbar. Egypt would go on to lose the game 2-1.

And perhaps – in fact – it is that snapshot that better encapsulates his contribution to this truncated World Cup campaign, the image of a toiling superstar struggling to drag his team through this most difficult of tournaments, any sign of genius quickly forgotten in favour of something more negative. He’s not the only one: Lionel Messi and Son Heung-min have also faltered under the unrelenting expectation.

Messi in particular makes for an interesting point of comparison. Both men are the heartbeats of their teams; both men have endured desperately disappointing campaigns with a permanently furrowed brow. And both have had to deal with a panoply of distracting off-the-field issues – from the chaos of Argentina’s camp as detailed here by Ed Malyon and Danny Fitzgerald, to Egypt’s controversial and scarcely believable decision to base themselves in Chechnya.

Will Mohamed Salah now walk out the door? (Getty)

But there is one key difference. Jorge Sampaoli’s muddled system shackled Messi and effectively wasted the brightest talent in world football. Whereas Héctor Cúper’s familiar 4-2-3-1 is designed purely to get the best from his star man – which worked excellently in World Cup qualification, where Salah topped the scoring with five goals.

Salah’s troubles have then stemmed from two sources: the injury he sustained in the Champions League final against Real Madrid, and becoming an unwitting publicity pawn for the Kremlin-backed leader of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov. And it is this latter headache that has led to the growing speculation that Salah is ready to walk away from the national team. “Fuming,” his agent Ramy Abbas enigmatically tweeted earlier this week.

The Egyptian FA moved quickly to deny a rift with Salah but those close to the player have suggested to The Independent and others that his future with the international team hangs in the balance. And if this does prove to be Salah’s final appearance in an Egypt shirt it demonstrated exactly what they will miss: a big-game player who, even when performing so well below his ceiling, was a cut above the rest of those on the pitch.

The Liverpool forward has had to deal with plenty of pressure (Getty)

It would be little short of a disgrace if the behaviour of the Egyptian FA – rather than the manager, or the national team – results in Salah deciding that now is the time he wishes to walk away. And although he will forever regard this campaign as a failure he can reflect on his contribution with pride: the scorer of two goals and provider of two standout moments while half-fit on the pitch and unfairly distracted off it.