Darwin Nunez - Thoughts?

[Mook]

Done more yesterday than Jota has done in about five games.

 

Loads of donkey work, a great bit of skill for the second & a screamer for the third & he's still getting stick. Mental.

[Bob]

6 minutes ago, Bjornebye said:

“Yeah she was fit and it was a great shag but she shouldn’t have shagged me” 

 

 

Fucking hell. The lads up against it. Fucking putaaaaa

Their mates do always say they shouldn't shaggy me, to be fair.

[Bob]

Just now, Mook said:

Done more yesterday than Jota has done in about five games.

 

Loads of donkey work, a great bit of skill for the second & a screamer for the third & he's still getting stick. Mental.

That's fair.

[Bernard Diomede]

He will always have games like yesterday, because he has got ability. But when it comes to the crunch he will still let you down in the big moments because he’s not consistently good enough. The evidence has been there for 2 years. Made up he played well and scored though. 

[Bjornebye]

6 minutes ago, Bob said:

Their mates do always say they shouldn't shaggy me, to be fair.

It wasn’t me 

[AngryofTuebrook]

1 hour ago, Bjornebye said:

“Yeah she was fit and it was a great shag but she shouldn’t have shagged me” 

 

 

Fucking hell. The lads up against it. Fucking putaaaaa

It's like Michael Owen's comment after that brilliant chip Nuñez scored a while back: it adds weight to the opinion that he's a scorer of great goals rather than a great goalscorer.

 

His all-round play was excellent yesterday, but his decision-making and positioning in the box needs to improve if he's going to be a regular goal threat.

[razor]

10 minutes ago, AngryOfTuebrook said:

It's like Michael Owen's comment after that brilliant chip Nuñez scored a while back: it adds weight to the opinion that he's a scorer of great goals rather than a great goalscorer.

 

His all-round play was excellent yesterday, but his decision-making and positioning in the box needs to improve if he's going to be a regular goal threat.

 

As a matter of interest, Mal, do you think that will happen?  Do you think he will improve?

[Bjornebye]

Just keep playing him!!!! Look what he does to defenders! Players around him play better as well and he gets the crowd up. The lads a genius and only a dickhead who doesn’t understand football doesn’t love him. 

[Rushies tash]

22 minutes ago, Bjornebye said:

Just keep playing him!!!! Look what he does to defenders! Players around him play better as well and he gets the crowd up. The lads a genius and only a dickhead who doesn’t understand football doesn’t love him. 

 

We're pissing in the wind here mate. He could score 30 like the one he scored yesterday and someone will still talk about that time he was offside.

[TD_LFC]

10 minutes ago, Rushies tash said:

 

We're pissing in the wind here mate. He could score 30 like the one he scored yesterday and someone will still talk about that time he was offside.

 

He doesn't though, does he.

[Rushies tash]

1 minute ago, TD_LFC said:

 

He doesn't though, does he.

 

If he gets the ball played into his runs more quickly, like yesterday, he very well could.

[Smell The Glove]

Nunez doesn't half get some ridiculous extreme positions from people. 

[Rushies tash]

1 minute ago, Smell The Glove said:

Nunez doesn't half get some ridiculous extreme positions from people. 

 

I dunno, I'd rather err on the side of supporting one of our players.

 

If his attitude stunk, it might be different, but he plays with an expression I would have if I was lucky enough to play professional football for Liverpool. 

[TD_LFC]

11 minutes ago, Rushies tash said:

 

If he gets the ball played into his runs more quickly, like yesterday, he very well could.

 

Not if the raft of chances he's missed in front of goal over the last two and a half years are anything to go by.

 

I'm all in on the mythical version of Nunez some people have but when that ideal is never met and the reason offered is that it's always other peoples fault then it's hard to buy in.

 

All yesterday did was prove that he's the player we've seen the last few season, streaky but occasionally able to pull a top goal out of nothing.

 

The true test of where he is and whether he's improved/improving is in doing the bread and butter stuff, can he put it away from 8 yards in the centre of goal or round the keeper and keep it on target consistently, can he score on a regular basis rather than it be feast or famine with 15 game stretches of nothing followed by a few goals in quick succession.

 

If he can we might finally have a player after 70 million and 2 seasons of nothing.

 

Edit: perhaps nothing is harsh, but very little in comparison to what we're told he could do if not for others holding him back.

[Reckoner]

Great celebration yesterday.

 

[Bobby Hundreds]

He still has it all to prove. Could do with some important goals when it matters. Of course they all matter but we need a player upfront like Salah has been who can win you games by hook or crook. There's nothing to gloat about with him yet, when he starts being a serious player the divided opinions won't be there.

[KMD7]

His goal yesterday should be a goal of the year contender.

[Smell The Glove]

30 minutes ago, Rushies tash said:

 

I dunno, I'd rather err on the side of supporting one of our players.

 

If his attitude stunk, it might be different, but he plays with an expression I would have if I was lucky enough to play professional football for Liverpool. 

There's supporting and there's talking nonsense. Yes there are weirdos who would prefer Nunez to fail to be proved right but the majority want him to succeed but you can't deny he's been a failure so far. 

 

Nunez has created this annoying aura (not his fault) of people commenting on him on a chance by chance basis but his overall picture is poor and that's nothing to do with service. You talk about 30 goals but he's only just over that total in his entire time here. He missed almost the same amount in big chances alone last season so he's had the pass played into him quickly more than enough. Of course there are times his runs have been missed, watch any game of football ever and it happens loads every single game. Rush would have a 1000 goals if we had hit his every run.

[AngryofTuebrook]

1 hour ago, razor said:

 

As a matter of interest, Mal, do you think that will happen?  Do you think he will improve?

I suspect not. 

[AngryofTuebrook]

55 minutes ago, Smell The Glove said:

Nunez doesn't half get some ridiculous extreme positions from people. 

Probably not alone in that: half the squad are either the greatest ever or should be binned.

[Mathewbet1]

What a goal, and the build up, goal of the season contender. Love his passion, he’s going to show us the whole of the moon this season.  

[Trojan1892]

His face when he scored was priceless, loved it more than the goal to be fair, he was genuinely buzzing.

[Scott_M]

Good performance yesterday and a great goal. 
 

Nunez, Gakpo & Diaz are setting new standards for themselves. They can’t be hot streaks, these need to be the standards now.  

[Barrington Womble]

4 hours ago, Bernard Diomede said:

He will always have games like yesterday, because he has got ability. But when it comes to the crunch he will still let you down in the big moments because he’s not consistently good enough. The evidence has been there for 2 years. Made up he played well and scored though. 

And we could say that about all our forwards apart from salah if we want to use their whole Liverpool careers as a reference. But we're seeing some consistency from Diaz now, that never looked like being there aside from his first couple of months here. There's no reason that can't apply to the others. 

 

I can't believe I'm actually going to agree with @Scott_M , but gakpo*, Nunez and Diaz have all shown what they can do already this season. Now we have to see it every week. 

 

* I reserve the right to hate on gakpo if he start bottling tackles again. 

[Scott_M]

17 minutes ago, Barrington Womble said:

I can't believe I'm actually going to agree with @Scott_M , but gakpo*, Nunez and Diaz have all shown what they can do already this season. Now we have to see it every week. 

 

* I reserve the right to hate on gakpo if he start bottling tackles again. 

This has been my point for a significant period - not all improvements need’s to come from transfers.

 

I’d prefer it at times (I still think we need somebody else in midfield), we shouldn’t disregard what we already have. They are all clearly very good footballers and seemingly have great attitudes - Mark Kennedy, Bruno Cheyrou, Eric Meijer, El Hadj Diouf etc are nowhere the quality or attitude (or both) of Nunez, Diaz and Gakpo. 

 

Diaz is on a great run now, it can’t be a hot streak. This needs to be his standard. Mane would chip in with approaching 20 league goals a season, if Diaz didn’t hit those numbers now, I think it would feel a bit disappointing. 
 

I’m not as taken on Nunez or Gakpo yet. I’d argue have just had their best performances in a red shirt in the last week.

 

Like all of Slot’s work so far, signs across the board are promising. This is only the start, still plenty of time for it to go wrong. Everybody needs to keep this up.