Jose Mourinho has claimed that the decision to sell Mohamed Salah during his time at Chelsea was the club’s and not his.

Salah joined the Blues in 2014, however made only three league appearances for the club before being shipped out on-loan to Serie A side Fiorentina in early 2015.

A subsequent loan spell with AS Roma followed, before he was sold permanently to I Giallorossi a season later.

At the time, Mourinho was quoted as saying: “I see his future elsewhere. Either on loan or sold with an offer we are happy to accept. We have five wingers and it is better not to have Salah back.”

The Egyptian returned to England last summer with Liverpool, and has produced one of the best individual season’s in the league history with Jurgen Klopp’s side.

Salah is currently the Premier League’s top scorer with 31 goals and only needs one more strike to break the scoring record for a 38-game top flight season. He was also named the PFA Player of the Year earlier this week.

The decision to sell Salah is now one in hindsight that Chelsea will no doubt regret, however Jose Mourinho insists if he would have had it his way, he would have kept him at Stamford Bridge.

“People say that I was the one that sold Salah and it is the opposite. I bought Salah,” he told ESPN Brazil.

“It is the opposite. I was the one that bought Salah. I was the one that told Chelsea to buy Salah.

“It was with me in charge that Salah came to Chelsea. But he came as a young kid, physically he was not ready, mentally he was not ready, socially and culturally he was lost and everything was tough for him.

“We decided to put him on loan and he asked for that as well. He wanted to play more minutes, to mature, he wanted to go and we sent him on loan to Fiorentina, and at Fiorentina he started to mature.”

He added: “Chelsea decided to sell him, OK? And when they say that I was the one that sold him it is a lie. I bought him. I agreed to send him on loan, I thought it was necessary.”

Salah returns to his former club next Sunday when Liverpool visit Stamford Bridge in the Premier League.