The Liverpool forward Mohamed Salah has been left out of the Egypt squad for a forthcoming friendly tournament during an international break towards the end of March.
The 31-year-old left the Africa Cup of Nations early when he picked up a hamstring injury on 18 January against Ghana and suffered another injury during a substitute appearance against Brentford on his return.
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Salah has been out of action since but returned to training this week and came off the bench in the 74th minute of their 5-1 thrashing of Sparta Prague on Thursday in the Europa League.
The Liverpool top scorer has 19 goals this campaign and his return to fitness sparked a club-versus-country row as Egypt previously rejected Liverpool’s request to exempt their captain from the tournament in Abu Dhabi, where they will face New Zealand on Friday 22 March and possibly Tunisia or Croatia in the subsequent final.
The Liverpool manager, Jürgen Klopp, previously said: “Two games with Egypt is really not up to me. We want to be careful, we have to be careful but we’re in the middle of a super-intense period of the season and we need everyone.”
However the Egypt FA have reportedly agreed to reluctantly leave their star player out of the international break and Salah will remain with Liverpool to work on his fitness for their title run-in.
