Man City 3-0 Liverpool: Match Review
Florian Wirtz joined Liverpool for £100 million but he is still to record a goal or an assist in the Premier League.
Germany boss Julian Nagelsmann has insisted that he is in regular contact with Florian Wirtz amid a slow start to his Liverpool career.
The attacking midfielder has yet to record a goal or an assist in 11 Premier League games as the Reds’ title defence looks to be over by November. Wirtz endured a difficult evening as Liverpool fell to a 3-0 loss against Manchester City.
The 22-year-old was one of the best players in the Bundesliga for Bayer Leverkusen. His performances convinced Liverpool to splash out a fee of £100 million, which could rise to £116 million with add-ons, in the summer transfer window.
But having been prolific in the final third at Leverkusen, Wirtz has failed to hit the ground running on Merseyside. He now heads off for Germany duty as they face 2026 World Cup qualifiers against Luxembourg and Slovakia.
Speaking at a press conference, Nagelsmann reckons that there are too many players at Liverpool who want to be the ‘star’ and that is why Wirtz is yet to thrive. Nagelsmann said: "I always speak to Flo, regardless of his situation. It's a very complex and difficult situation when you look at his club. Last year they won the Premier League and played very attractive football. This year a few players left them, and they invested a lot of money on new players.
“So the entire mix is very complex - each of the five attacking players wants to be the 'star player', this situation doesn't make it easy for Flo - because the entire club is not as stable as they were last season. I watched the game against City and they were the worse team over 90 minutes.
“It's not easy for Flo to put his mark in such a situation. We can see that a lot of players struggle when they move to another club where there have been many changes. In the end, I can't influence his performances at Liverpool. I can only influence what he does here. I think he made steps in the right direction in October. We all know what he can do, it's normal to have a dip in form. We'll help and support him to keep a clear head.”
‘It’s an issue’
Wirtz’s performance against Man City drew criticism from Gary Neville. The Sky Sports pundit claimed that Wirtz reminded him of a ‘little boy’. Speaking on The Gary Neville Podcast, he said: “I thought Wirtz, in particular, it was a bad day for him. We’ve been tiptoeing around him, haven’t we, for a few months around the fact that he’s young, he’s come to a new country. You’re going to have to stand up soon. He’s obviously got something. He’s a really good player, technically fantastic but he’s been mauled out there by [Matheus] Nunes and by others.
“He’s been chucked around the pitch and didn’t deliver in the quality side of things. His performance was a real worry. Physically, I’d be really worried if I were Arne Slot looking at that team. Wirtz is a problem, let’s be clear. Let’s call it as it is. It’s an issue. To be fair, I said a few weeks ago about [Milos] Kerkez that he looks like a little boy out there. Wirtz looked like a little boy and that can’t be the case. He’s a German international of great standing and he looks well short in respect of what you’d expect in a top physical match.
“They have got to get him up to speed and got to get that sort of tenacity into him, that little bit of something that means he will get into form. It means that he will have to stick with him and persist but they’ve got to find a way to get the best out of him.”
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