Mo Salah walks through the mixed zone after the Leeds–Liverpool 3–3 draw at Elland Road and it’s the post-match interview heard around the world.
For the uninitiated, players have to walk through the mixed zone, in effect, to leave the stadium.
Players almost always walk straight through, and straight past the gathered media posse.
This time, Salah’s actions were contrived and pre-planned. There is nothing new in sportsmen and women using the media for their own ends.
Often players in the twilight of their careers will suddenly undergo a personality bypass. They become approachable, talk to the media, sometimes even share their mobile number with journalists and producers, usually with one eye on the bright lights of TV and media broadcast opportunities post-career.
This feels different. Many have made the point that Mo Salah uses the media to his advantage. So what?
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Salah, lovely player, to state the obvious. And anyone with a predilection for FPL will hold him dear to their hearts.
But he does say stuff. He has things he wants to say. Okay, so he hasn’t made himself available to the press on a regular basis since his arrival at Anfield in 2017, but when he does, boy, does it stop the press.
In August this year, Salah called out UEFA over a tribute to Palestinian footballer Suleiman al-Obeid that it posted on social media, a tribute which failed to refer to the circumstances surrounding his death.
A fascinating intervention, and something this correspondent would like to see from more athletes.
On this occasion, his actions are clearly motivated by broken dressing-room relationships, and an underlying feeling of being undervalued and unappreciated (by fans and media).
I was cooking up another missive when this particular media story erupted.
It’s 20 years since a similar example of player media manipulation, a footballer using the media to share their message, and a slice of unexpected radio gold was broadcast to the footballing nation.
For a while, Real Radio was a player in the broadcast landscape across the UK. The highlight in Wales was its evening sports phone-in: listeners venting and high-profile pundits offering hot takes.
One of the regular guests on the phone-in was Leighton James, the former Wales winger whose pace and balance made him a favourite throughout the 70s and 80s. Charismatic, bolshy and forthright, and never shy of calling footballing truth to power! He was a fantastic pundit.
Robbie Savage, a combative box-to-box midfielder, part human, part golden retriever, had spells at Leicester, Birmingham, Blackburn and Derby, and earned 39 caps for Wales.
He bagged the odd worldie, never let Wales down, especially in the famous 2002 win over Italy, delivering the kind of relentless midfield performance Wales might well need again if they end up facing the Italians in a March 2026 World Cup qualifier.
During this period, he was dropped by manager John Toshack, and his absence from the squad had become a long-running saga in the media.
Savage asked to go on the Real Radio show. From the moment presenter Alex Feeney introduced the guests, it was dynamite. James, never one to sugar-coat anything, fired this bullet:
“One day, when you get a grasp of the English language, you’ll become a pundit.”
Prescient words from James, as Savage would go on to become not just a pundit, but an excellent presenter of BBC 5 Live’s 606 phone-in.
Savage hit back:
“You had a hidden agenda to get Toshack the job.”
James didn’t blink.
“Your toys came out of the pram, and you retired.”
“Get off your soap box”.
And on it went. The faint aroma of performing seals.
It’s a broadcast moment that still resonates. But is it a reminder of a media landscape with louder, more varied, more unpredictable spaces?
Digital platforms allow for the democratisation of production and publication, though among the ubiquitous podcasts and YouTube channels, does anything come close to Savage and James’s slanging match on live radio?
I could go on here about how since 2005, Wales’s media landscape has shifted dramatically. Commercial radio choice has faded, the news industry has shrunk, and what once felt like a broad, boisterous broadcast ecosystem has narrowed into something much thinner.
How the Welsh public sphere has lost depth and plurality. But that can wait for another column.
So, back to footballers using their platform to share their stories.
Resist wallowing further in the Salah-socials rage-bait.
Kick back with an eggnog and early Chrimbo cheeseboard, and enjoy my festive gift to you… Leighton James v Robbie Savage on the Real Radio phone-in. Nadolig Llawen.
Andrew Weeks is a lecturer in the school of journalism, media and culture at Cardiff University. You can read his regular columns here.
