Al-Ittihad have revived their interest in Liverpool forward Mohamed Salah, but now want to sign another Premier League superstar to pair him up with, a report has claimed.
Back in September, Al-Ittihad presented Liverpool with a world-record transfer bid for Salah, but – partially because it was outside the English transfer window – the Reds resisted their attempts to lure the Egypt international away.
Salah remains in demand within the Saudi Pro League ahead of the summer transfer window, at which point there will only be one year remaining on his contract with Liverpool, unless they can tie him down to a new deal.
According to FootballTransfers, Al-Ittihad are thinking of replacing Karim Benzema in the summer, so have resumed their pursuit of Salah.
However, they may also move on from Romarinho when his contract expires, so a second Premier League forward is on their radar.
The player in question is Tottenham captain Son Heung-min, who also only has a contract until 2025 with his current employers.
The report hints Son could consider leaving Tottenham if they fail to qualify for the Champions League for the second year running, in which case Al-Ittihad could pounce.
Last season’s Saudi Pro League champions had been linked with a different Tottenham forward at a similar time to their original pursuit of Salah, when Richarlison was under consideration.
However, now the attention has turned to Son, who – despite reports he wants to finish his career with Tottenham – Al-Ittihad dream of placing on the left-hand side of an attack that would also feature Salah on the right wing and this season’s top scorer Abderrazak Hamdallah down the middle.
Liverpool and Tottenham fighting to keep stars
Since both Salah and Son still have a year remaining on their contracts with their respective clubs, they could still have significant price tags attached to them.
FootballTransfers does not mention how much either of them might cost, but Liverpool and Tottenham will be trying to resist any pressure from Saudi Arabia.
Son has starred for Tottenham since 2015 and Salah has for Liverpool since 2017, meaning they have both been long-time key players in the Premier League.
For example, the season before last, they shared the Golden Boot in the Premier League with 23 goals each.
As goalscorers, Salah and Son are both members of the Premier League’s 100 club. In fact, Sergio Aguero is the only non-European to have outscored Salah in the competition’s history; Aguero, Salah and Dwight Yorke are the only players above Son in that category.
As a left-footed right-winger and a right-footed left-winger respectively, Salah and Son could in theory feature in the same system as each other.
There was even supposed interest from Liverpool in signing Son from Tottenham for themselves back in 2022, which would have enabled him to have linked up with Salah already, but a transfer never materialised.
