Darwin NUNEZ: 2024/25

Kirkby 2024/25
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My apologies for poor phrasing. I’m talking specifically with regards to the criticism of his finishing, which despite the chances he misses, does let him score quite a good few.

I do watch the games. I’m just more than mildly irritated by how people have their favourites and will have double standards.

I don’t even think that highly of Núñez, that’s the only thing that I’m being contorted into. I think he’s a player whose current level is not where it could be, but it’s at worst a squad rotation player level. I do think that when Jota is fit again, and he gets a run of games, people will start to miss Núñez and romanticise what he offers.

I’m really just against overreactions, suggesting that he’s not going to improve, that we should move him on, when he’s precisely at the kind of age when most players actually start to shine/peak. One would think given all the talk that he was at least a couple of years older than he actually is.

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Alisson, Trent, Konate since Paris (that is basically the moment he overtook Matip in the pecking order), Robertson, Mac Allister last season, Gravenberch this season. Just to name a few in that period.

The end goal is not to rotate as much as we can, we don’t do it for fun (we have to do it), but there are players who are regular starters and who aren’t. Nunez never really cemented his place up top, for reasons of a lack of quality.

That is pretty clear, we’re not comparing an absolute machine like Salah who rarely gets rested. Of course we have to rotate to a certain extent, but even with that in account, Nunez has so far failed to make that position his own.

Quality players look at least good in every scenario, but as the team gets assembled with more quality and more sense (important!), they become even better than good, as does the team.

Quality, key individuals make the process faster, which Nunez was brought in to be. A protagonist to settle in and enhance this team, which came a few goals short of a quadruple 21/22 season. And someone who we’d build our next attack around, which also doesn’t look like it will be the case.

Putting style and the general debate whether a player like Nunez was what we needed in 2022 aside, that is overall a pretty good situation to join the club. Would it have been easier for him in 2015 or 2016, or would he end up like Benteke or later Origi? Which side or year would he pick to join?

I didn’t know what our “expectation at best” was to compete for CL spots, that was simply our next step at the time after that horrible night in Basel. We had to return and then we could kick on, with no limits in mind. Pretty sure Klopp, his coaching staff and the club had that in mind when we were signing these players.

We didn’t go buying one set of players to return to the top 4 and then another set of players to compete for major trophies. Sure, you always look to add and things are not always perfectly aligned in terms of timing (peaks of all players, but in this case it’s true that a lot of them peaked when Klopp’s team was at it’s absolute best, from 2018 to 2020).

Those individuals came in, became starters, important players. This has not been the case with Nunez, because of his quality.

Jota came in to be our 4th choice forward, add competition in at least 2 if not all 3 positions and perhaps grow into a starter. Had his injuries for almost half the time and has his own weaknesses, but he also had his runs in the team and was so far a comfortably better player and better fit than Nunez. Now, they’re battling for the same spot, which also speaks volumes.

You said no one performed, which isn’t true. You questioned if it’s because he didn’t perform well enough… no, it’s because something in the air hasn’t clicked for all his tools which are apparently top player material. Of course it’s because he didn’t perform well enough.

If you make it a contest between Salah and Nunez for goals and assists, Nunez loses it (in terms of combined goals and assists in games, it’s at an acceptable number, still I think…). Knowing also that the game is more than just goals and assists, including the jobs of forwards, Nunez has issues in other aspects as well. Which brings him to these situations and debates. He does provide certain qualities, of course.

The situation most probably is that we’re generally happy with our 5-6 forwards, in 2 of 3 positions still not where we want to be. On the left, we have a direct battle between Diaz and Gakpo. Which is leaking into another player (Diaz), stealing Nunez’s minutes.

Luckily, we have players who perform when Nunez can’t, or can’t on a consistent basis (I rarely saw him playing really well and scoring for, what, more than 2-3 games or so).

At the same time, if an important offer came in for Nunez, I’m pretty sure we’d at least consider. Great opportunity to move on. Because of the high fee, Liverpool buying that player, wages, years of contract (not eternal though), us naturally giving him more than one season (he earned it), it’s hard to get him out of here.

The pitch doesn’t show me they see him as the main option, more as one of the options. Unless something seriously changes, it’s most probably a path towards the exit doors.

I don’t see the narrative being problematic or overexaggarated at all, it’s all there on the pitch and stats are only a tool to confirm what we’re seeing. He’s got his strong points, which he doesn’t show consistent enough and he has his weak points, which are not improving enough.

He’s a player who gets terrific support from the fans on the pitch. It’s almost like we’ve all accepted that this ain’t really gonna work, but we’re proudly sticking behind him because he physically tries very hard (not always the smartest), goes on a crazy press, tackle, scores the odd worldie or whatever. A mad bastard, our mad bastard. It’s cute, even admirable, but the quality is not enough.

Off the pitch and off the stands, it’s absolutely a topic to debate, ask questions and not be at peace with. Because this hasn’t worked nowhere near planned so far and there are more indications that it won’t.

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Not ideal, but generally positive yeah.

Plus, when you bring someone like that, you’d expect not only him individually to do well (better than so far), but also influence his nearby team mates.

I have my questions and the conclusion might be for another day whether around €200m on our last 4 (but really 3, not gonna judge Chiesa yet) forwards was money well spent.

All other forwards have their weaknesses. We can continue talking about Nunez or we can also talk about others. It’s not helping his case enough I don’t think.

But all of them have showed more, either that they have better quality or are a better fit.

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I genuinely think Nunez gets too much criticism - his faults over stated and expectations for him not carried over to his teammates when they make the same mistakes (much forgotten now, but before Jota got injured he, the “clinical finisher” missed a succession of big chances). But you look at Isak on their second goal and there is a level of savviness that we’ll just never see from Nunez. He had run offside and was left alone by our defenders, but rather than immediately getting himself back into an onside position where he would come back onto the radar of our CBs, he hung around in an offside position until it was possible for someone to get the ball to him and then pulled away onto our RB, creating a 2-1 on him.

Gomez can and should do better to make sure he doesn’t lose sight of where he is and where he is going to reappear, but it was fantastic CF play. Isak would be an absolutely wonderful addition in terms of pure football, but the concerns are the cost and a succession of injuries he’s had over his first two season (seemingly better last year)

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I thought something similar but not because of that particular moment (which was excellent striker’s play, it has to be said) but because of his overall game awareness and creative passing. Isak being there, playing like that (and scoring) just emphasised what Nunez wasn’t and would never be for Liverpool, making his performance look even worse to me.

There was a part of me that immediately thought of Danns and those few minutes he played last season where he looked like a kid version of Isak but you can never tell if any kid is going to make it even without any injuries, let alone with them.

Maybe I’m focusing too much on what Nunez isn’t but the biggest thing that he isn’t is “a reliable goalscorer”. Everything else would be forgiven if he could just put the ball in the back of the net more often. This is what has me convinced he has no future at Liverpool beyond this season. Jota had a dry spell once but it came between two pretty prolific spells - Nunez hasn’t had one in two and a half seasons with Liverpool.

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It is a bastardized reinterpretation of a story told by Graham himself.

Firstly, our data approach doesn’t really allow for us to be fooled by a 6 month golden period, especially not for high priced targets. It covers too big a period with too many games to be tricked into thinking short term statistical variance represented the player’s true quality

Secondly, what Graham and the team explained to Klopp was that there was no doubt that Darwin scored among the best strikers in the world according to their data. However, our data guys dont just score players in absolute terms, they also score them according to what we’re looking for in a player in that position and have a category of “great player, but not a Liverpool player”. That was how they identified Darwin due to the situations in which he contributed positively. Critically though, with Bobby on his way out and an acceptance that there was no like for like replacement for him, Klopp and Pep were already looking at how the entire team would have to change to move on from him. Darwin’s “lack of fit” was viewed in that context and considered fine for what they wanted to turn the next iteration of the team into.

The dumb version of the story on the internet is Klopp got a boner after we played Benfica and because he had turned into a dictator told all the rest of the recruitment team trying to shut down the idea to shut up and know their place. The actual story is that everyone was on board with Darwin being a gem and acknowledged it would take some tweaks of how we play to get the best from him, but those were tweaks we were already being forced into because of Bobby’s pending exit.

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And you know this how? :thinking:

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Graham literally has a book about his process and has spoken about how it applied to Darwin oin several occasions

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Salah had/has the least defensive duties/actions compared to the opposite flank.

Yes Nunez role was was further up field more as a spearhead, which is explained with his numerous offsides.

Finally Darwin is having to help link play more with our slower build up to feet and mostly struggles.

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The thing is that it’s not an overreaction to say that he isn’t going to improve or to want him replaced by someone better. It’s a perfectly logical and valid opinion and the most probable outcome. This is his third season, and his output hasn’t improved; on the contrary, it’s worsened. He’s improved considerably in every other facet of the game except the one that matters the most and is his main job, converting chances. At some point, there will be an inquest internally and a decision will be taken.

It’s a shame really, because everyone can see that he’s got the talent to succeed, but not the mental make-up.

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I dont think Darwin’s game has actually improved. I think he has been an effective if clumsy looking link up player, especially the way he combined with Mo, from day 1 and it has always been an underrated part of his game. But I think the most relevant point is that regardless of what any arguments any of us might want to make for or against him, after 2 and half seasons he has failed to establish himself as a critical player. That is not what you need from a player you spent 80 million on. After this long there is little reason to think there is a different level he can find, and so we have to accept him on these terms, not on considerations of how much better he can be only he can do x, y or z.

I think most would consider him to still have value for the team, but we are now firmly in the territory of considering how much better we would be if we had an 80million pound striker who delivered at that level, and if there are opportunities, and at what cost, if we would make that happen.

I like him. I do think his value is under rated and his limitations over emphasized and would be happy to have him continue playing this role. But if there was an opportunity to bring in someone like the Swedish lad from Sporting (I dont know if he is good enough, but a player of that sort of profile) and fund the majority of it with an exit for Darwin I think it would be considered.

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Quansah last season displaced Konaté. It’s not as static as you want to portray it to be.

I guess next you’ll tell me that Díaz and Gakpo are both lacking in quality hence the constant rotating between them. The problem I have with your examples is since then, we’ve been trying to move away from having players be “regular starters” in the sense that you speak of. That merry-go-round between Konaté, Matip, and Gomez is one such example, before Quansah was added to that mix too.

And just to be clear, are you adding Jota to that classification of “not a regular starter” too?

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Games, starts, minutes for Jota through his time with us.

Again, I’m going to dispute that, given that Mané is a quality player, but he had more than his fair share of struggles.

I think that’s kind of self-contradictory isn’t it? If he was that last piece in the puzzle, we wouldn’t have needed to rebuild and reconfigure around him.

I’m not sure if any player would say they would prefer to join a weaker side, but that aside, I still dispute the characterisation that being in a team that’s beginning to click together is any worse than being in a team that’s struggling.

We did not, but my point is that Mané and Firmino’s performances when they first came in weren’t too far off what Núñez has produced, but the expectations of them were different.

I think it’s quite absurd to say that he isn’t an important player nor a starter, simply because he has started many games, rather regularly. We just have other options too.

Not sure how it’s the case that it speaks volumes, unless your point is exactly what I’m making, which is that Núñez is at the very least on the level of our other forwards.

I’m not sure which player really stood out during 2022-23, a season where we couldn’t even make it into the Champions League spots? Last season, we always had players come into and out of form. Salah was (erroneously) widely spoken of as having been completely been out of form after the previous AFCON for more than half a season.

If Salah, a world-class veteran coming towards the end of his peak years cannot outperform Núñez, a player only just coming into his peak years, then either he’s not worth a new contract at all, or it’s simply a comparison between two players at vastly different stages of their careers.

That’s because you’re myopically focused on the idea that if a player doesn’t start virtually all the games, they aren’t of good enough quality. It’s called managing fitness.

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Even in his latter years (this is from 2019-20 to 2021-22) Mané wasn’t a regular starter by your definition.

If an important offer came in for any of our players, we’d be happy to move them on.

I’m not entirely sure I’d consider our inability to win more games last season down to our forwards. I’d also consider that given we have won 18 of our 21 games this season thus far, it’s a little odd to question them that much.

Money is only relevant as to what else it can buy you. Even Isak’s transfer wasn’t that cheap, and he didn’t score a mountain of goals for Real Sociedad either.

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He’s actually been oddly consistent in a way, his goals/assists seem to be rather spread out. His current dry spell is actually his equal longest for us, but even then it’s only been 4 games (last contribution was a goal against Villa). This has only happened at the start of this season and starting from the game he got his red card in in his first season.

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I don’t think it works that way. I think it’s pretty much an ongoing process of review as to where the players are, and what the market is like.

His conversion rate is actually up this season, but based on a small sample. He has marginally more shots on target, but is converting more of those shots on target. He’s just been taking much fewer shots, half of what he used to do.

He hasn’t actually gotten worse in finishing chances, I characterise it as an overreaction because of how it’s being described as though he shares joint responsibility with Kelleher for losing us the points, when in reality, the chances that he missed came before Salah’s second, so the game would probably have panned out differently, in a way we can’t really tell. But given that it’s a game where both sides took the lead at some point, I would venture to say that it likely wouldn’t have changed the outcome that much.

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He started a few games near the end of the season ahead of him. Overall, Konate is a regular starter for us and our 2nd best CB.

Between Diaz and Gakpo, it’s pretty much form in shorter periods that decides who starts on the left wing. Players of let’s say similar level of quality. And now, since both are in good form lately, we’ve seen Diaz pushing some of Nunez’s minutes centrally. Of course, without Jota, we do need two options in rotation.

We came to this when you said that Nunez isn’t playing more because we have to rotate. It’s pretty clear to everyone that even with rotation taken into account, he’s not made himself a more important, regular starter so far in his Liverpool career because of a lack of quality. Like others have.

Jota has his injuries, that’s why he missed a lot of games over his years here. But when he was fit, so far he was a better player and better fit for us than Nunez.

Mane on the left in 18/19 (when his absolute peak started) was better and more rounded than Mane on the right in 16/17, but he already became a key player, with whom we saw we could continue building for the future.

Both Firmino and Mane showed very early that they are key players for us and will continue to be. We cannot only compare their goals and assists and then pull out some hope that Nunez will also become that, only because he scored 15 and 18 in his first two seasons. Different players. Firmino regardless of his 11 and then 12 goals in his first two seasons, became vital for the way we played, offensively and defensively. First as a #10/second striker in 15/16 since Klopp took over and then as the false #9 in 16/17.

Expectations were different because we were certainly better and more successful in 2022. As was Nunez’s level so far, different from what we thought/hoped we would get from him. I don’t know about expectations from different players, from whom and how you measure that.

My writing on a forum has 0 influence how Nunez does at Liverpool, but in my mind, I give every player a chance. With Nunez, I was just curious, because I didn’t know much about him. His high transfer fee is not the reason why we talk about him, but for what happened so far and what might happened, it is relevant.

After his first season, I thought he certainly deserves another one. But then two is not the same as three, four or even six (probably won’t happen). Now we’re getting to a point when he’s had more than enough chances and it’s a serious topic, no need to be shocked if there’s attention on him. There actually is more on other stuff, perhaps because truth hurts sometimes.

You should be able to tell the difference between a regular starter, a key player who we fully trust and someone who we’re still unsure about, trying to get more out of, rotating him, etc. Because he’s not showing enough to merit more. That is very easy to recognize.

Salah has outperformed Nunez in basically the whole of his time here. Of course, there were games when it was different.

I wish it was because of managing fitness, that Nunez is this successful signing and we have to rest him here and there for the good of him and the good of the team. But that’s not the reason, or not the main reason. Quality is.

Mane was always a regular starter here, nobody said that only robots like Virgil and Salah who hardly miss a game when they’re fit are viewed as regular starters, you did.

Every player has a price we’d at least consider, but they’re not of the same importance. We rejected a serious offer from Saudi for Salah (maybe he wasn’t ready for that move anyway). If we got or get around a third of that offer, I think we would Nunez go.

Other members mentioned Isak. There are different ways how to get quality players.

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That’s a rather charitable interpretation. It was easily a quarter of a season if not more, including most of the domestic cup games. Konaté himself was not preferred ahead of Matip either, when the latter was fit. It was quite a regular rotation.

Again, that’s just your personal interpretation of the situation, which really isn’t backed up by the simple fact that when we have had the quality, we rotate.

Again, that’s being rather charitable with the number of games he’s had where he hasn’t contributed anything whether offensively or defensively. Just wait when he’s back in the spotlight again. It’s a regular thing for most of our players. It’s just that those games don’t happen to be very often, and confirmation bias naturally leads to the perception that either it’s just a blip in form, or it’s just the player being not good enough, depending on whichever your pre-existing internal narrative already was.

Surely given how much you have written on Firmino, you can give more details on what Mané offered in addition to goals and assists that Núñez hasn’t?

My point is quite the opposite of what you’re saying. I’m not saying that their example means he will definitely follow it. I’m saying that their examples show that a player isn’t fully developed until well past their mid-20s, which can often be accompanied by a rather big increase in their output. Look at Salah as another example.

Unless you’re completely isolated from general football conversation (and by virtue of being on here it’s unlikely that’s the case), then you would be aware of his fee and the comparison being made in the media with Haaland, which already frames the initial impression.

I think that makes a lot of assumptions about what a manager’s intent is, and again, given all that you have said thus far, is very much dependent on your pre-existing biases.

If you’re comparing them within the same games, then of course that would be the case. I would expect no less. You’re comparing a top-of-his-game Salah to a developing Núñez.

Mané’s competition/cover while he was here was Origi, Jota, and who else? In his last season he had Díaz, but it was also the time when he was moved to the centre, and it was Firmino who lost the playing time. I can’t remember the latter’s injury periods, but in our quadruple-chasing season, he was not a “regular starter”, whatever your definition was.

I can’t look up Mané’s injury record either, but his starts were often just 82% of a season at best:

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Yes, but that’s your opinion of the situation, not what the club would do. I would say it’s what the club does that has the most information value, since they have far more expertise and insight than we do.

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Most of 21/22 was the last time when Matip still had the advantage over Konate. Konate then got the nod in Paris and since then, he basically made that spot his own.

We don’t rotate everyone equally and by default, there are reasons why some players are preferred over others. Quality, form, style, experience, understading with other players.

Jota certainly had his games below level, when he was not involved enough (especially in possession, because off the ball he’s arguably our best pressing forward), be it on the wing or centrally up top. Had a dry goalscoring spell in the second half of the 21/22 season (but funny enough, I remember he still performed well in a lot of those games). But overall, so far he provided more for us than Nunez.

Mane offered us a quality threat in transitions, someone who can take out players, dribble, able to attack both on the outside and the inside, being a threat with both feet (which he already showed at Southampton). Regardless if he was on the right or left side. On the left side, after a more difficult spell in the middle of the 17/18 season, he then became more complete and started losing less possession. He had to, because now his best foot was more “facing the game”. He finished that season with 20 goals and then went onto a new level in 18/19, entering his absolute peak.

Players’ development can be very different in terms of age. All those mentioned players hit a higher level and earlier than Nunez, who is not making enough development, in the middle of his third season here. We have to look at players themselves. Nunez is not too young and not too old. He is a fit guy. It should be happening now. Because we cannot afford to give him time until he’s 28 or whatever is universally agreed as a players’ peak (doesn’t have to be).

Well I’m also surprised that you’re not isolated from football conversations and I have to explain what a regular starter means: between someone like Salah someone like Morton (just throwing examples from different sides), there are players who are more important than others, by merit.

Anyway, I like talking about our players and it really doesn’t matter to me if it’s transfers like Carroll or Nunez or Degen or Kyrgiakos. But in former cases, yeah, the whole level of transfer and financial aspect of the deal needs to be taken into account for the past, present and future.

I don’t have a bias against Nunez, it’s you who thought I hate him. Perhaps you have an issue with how much people speak about certain players? Nunez is objectivelly a topic to discuss a lot, more than someone settled, proven, successful, without rumours of leaving, contract expiring, etc. It’s how it works.

Salah even on a bad day mainly provides more than Nunez, often “just” through sheer numbers. He finds a way. Nunez struggles to find a way even on his best day, whatever that looks like.

Nunez can develop… at Almeria or Benfica. This is a bit different now and he hasn’t developed much here. Okay, let’s be fair, you can always develop or at least try to maintain a high level by trying to develop.

Bobby did have injury issues at different times in the second half of the 21/22 season and yeah, he was slowly past his peak (not linnear though until he left).

Injuries are injuries, it’s pretty clear who were/are our key men when they’re fit. Which is not dependent on any bias, narrative, or whatever. Some things are clear as day on the pitch.

My opinion against your opinion, we both can’t tell for sure what the club would do if they got more or less a £50m offer for Nunez “tomorrow” (say, next summer). I think we’d gladly take it and move on.

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Except that’s not true. It was only March 2023 to the end of that season that Konaté was preferred to Matip, and when both were fit at the start of the next season, Matip was preferred until he got injured.

He’s had many games where even his pressing was sub-par. I’m not surprised that he provided more for us than Núñez has, because once again, he joined us when he was 24. He’s a few years older than Núñez is.

It’s arguable that they hadn’t hit those levels before they were his age, that’s the point I keep trying to make and that you keep ignoring by talking about how they were at their peaks.

No, it’s because people differ on what they mean by regular starters. If you consider both Díaz and Gakpo regular starters, you’d also have to consider Núñez a regular starter.

When I say bias, I mean an opinion formed of him. It’s a basic fact of human psychology. You can call it impression, if that makes you feel better.

The word “hate” was used tongue-in-cheek. I do have an issue with how people are overly sensitive to form and praise players to the high heavens when they do slightly better than average, and then tear into them when they’re not doing well.

They are literally not. You want to believe that you’re objective, that it’s clear as day, but it’s quite clearly not. You want to believe that Konaté won his place and cemented it in 2022, but it’s quite clearly not the case, factually speaking. There are some players who play more than others, but it’s not as clear-cut as them “winning their place” but rather the alternatives not being close enough in standard, or simply that the risk of changing things up is greater than the benefits it brings.

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Konate had injuries in all seasons (unfortunately including this one), but when all fit and available, he earned himself this position in the pecking order. It was helped that he could do a job both at RCB and LCB, which Matip couldn’t do (at least never did).

When Jota’s pressing was below level, which I don’t remember much of, I wonder how our pressing as a whole looked like. He is our best pressing forward I think our most intelligent forward (one of our most intellingent players overall).

Jota joined us when he was 24 and Nunez joined us when he was 22… big difference. A difference of 41 games, taking Jota’s injuries into account.

Not all players will earn the same amount of time at a club, not all players will develop in the same way, not all players will peak at the same time.

I wasn’t only talking about other players’ peaks, but also their levels before it. They didn’t go from these highly rotational options, club being unsure about them to their peaks just like that. They were already at higher levels and we were both getting more and more convinced about building a future with them.

It is how it is. From what I can see, although I only hear the atmosphere in the stands (apart from the few games a season I see live) and read these forums, coupled with a few LFC supporting friends… Nunez still gets a lot of support considering the type of transfer and, more importantly, his success so far here.

Football hasn’t reached yet a level where we have 22 players being rotated between themseleves almost equally. Cohesion is needed, understanding between them and that requires most positions on the pitch having your regular starters on paper.

We’re not leaving Nunez out like some flops in the past. He is useful and we also have to make him useful, but so far has struggled to make such an impact that he has this position for longer than he has managed (like other players have). And that patience has it’s expiry date, which might be in the summer of 2025 or 2026. I hope there won’t have to be a loan included in the mean time.