"He was in tears" - Former Chelsea star recalls incident involving Liverpool superstar Mo Salah and Jose Mourinho

John Obi Mikel has recalled an incident from his Chelsea days when Mohamed Salah was left in tears. He claims that Jose Mourinho's approach at half-time was too much for the Egyptian, and Salah was seen crying in the dressing room.

The Liverpool striker did not have a great time at Chelsea despite joining with a lot of hype from FC Basel. He struggled to get minutes and was eventually loaned out before being sold.

Mikel claims that Salah was not good enough in the first half of a game, and Mourinho made it known in the dressing room. The current Liverpool star was stunned and left in tears. Mikel recalled:

"I think (Salah) was having a bad game, and then obviously Mourinho came in and ripped into him, massively ripped into him. He was in tears, and what happened is (Mourinho) didn't let him back onto the pitch in the second half. He took him off. It would have been easy to just take him off and say 'you're not playing well, off you go, sit down, you're not going back onto the pitch.' But he ripped into him and took him off."

Salah scored just twice in 19 games with the Blues before he was loaned out to Fiorentina in 2015 and sold to AS Roma later that year.

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Mohamed Salah on his time at Chelsea

Mohamed Salah has admitted that he was unable to handle the pressure at Chelsea. He believes he had bad advice at that time and just wanted to play more.

Speaking to GQ, Salah said:

"When I look back, (I had) bad advice with the situation. It was so tough for me, mentally. I couldn't handle the pressure I had from the media, coming from outside. I was not playing that much. I felt, 'No, I need to go'."

The Egyptian added:

"You have two choices: to tell the people that they are right to put you on a bench, or to prove them wrong. I needed to prove them wrong. The best thing you could have is a serious conversation with yourself. Just get a coffee, and just sit like this, and just ask yourself what you want."

Salah returned to the Premier League with Liverpool in 2017 and has gone on to become a club legend at Anfield, scoring 174 goals in 286 games.