Mohamed Salah knows not to dive, says Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp

The Egyptian forward has come under fire in recent weeks for hitting the ground too easily

Jurgen Klopp says he hasn't spoken to Mohamed Salah about diving. Reuters

Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp has spoken in defence of Mohamed Salah after the striker was recently accused of diving.

Salah has been involved in several high-profile incidents over the past couple of months - most recently with Mamadou Sakho in Liverpool's 4-3 Premier League win over Crystal Palace - and has come in for heavy criticism for going to ground too easily in the penalty area.

However, Klopp feels that the player knows whether he is in the right or not, and feels that playing for a club like Liverpool has added to the furore.

He spoke at length about Salah's alleged theatrics and likened his situation to that of Leicester City's Jamie Vardy, who has also been accused of trying to deceive referees.

“If this is the first situation where he went down without [a penalty] and you speak about all the other situations as well when the other situations there is nothing to talk about – it is a penalty, done. If this is the first then why do we talk about?

“Did anyone talk to Jamie Vardy when, I forget the opponent [Southampton], everybody saw. You remember the situation? That was a proper – he jumped in. Is Jamie a bad person because of that? I don’t say now he is a diver. That is another situation.

“You have them [Sakho] in the back, you are there, you feel something, do you have to go down? Probably not. I don’t have to speak to players about obvious things. He knows that. Don’t go down in situations like that. But there are other situations, much more obvious situations, that we don’t talk about and nobody is talking about because it’s not City, it’s not United, it’s not Liverpool, it’s not Arsenal or it’s not Chelsea. All the others can do it from time to time and nobody really talks about it. It’s all fine.

“All the penalties against him [Salah] were penalties but people handle it like it was halfway diving – it was not. We don’t need blood for a foul in football. That’s all I will say about it. No, I didn’t speak to him about it.”

Against Newcastle on Boxing Day Salah won a penalty, which he converted, in which he appeared to go to ground under minimal contact from Paul Dummett. The English Football Association reviewed the incident after the match but decided Salah's actions did not breach its threshold of "deception of a match official".

On December 29 Salah was awarded a spot kick after a coming together with Arsenal defender Sokratis Papastathopoulos as he closed in on goal. On January 12, Salah was awarded another penalty against Brighton & Hove Albion after coming into contact with Pascal Gross.

Liverpool face Leicester City in the Premier League on Wednesday having not been in action at the weekend due to their early FA Cup exit.

They spent last week in Dubai on a warm weather training camp.