Florian Wirtz arrived at Anfield with a reputation that bordered on untouchable. J\u00fcrgen Klopp described him as a \u201conce-in-a-century talent.\u201d Liverpool backed that belief with a $159 million move as part of their rebuild before the 2025-26 campaign, expecting him to help drive the club into a new level under Arne Slot.<\/p>\n
So far, though, the story has not matched the scale of the investment. At 23, Wirtz has often failed to influence Liverpool when they have needed him most, and his performances are being judged more harshly with each passing week.<\/p>\n
The logic behind the signing was obvious. At Bayer Leverkusen, Wirtz produced numbers that made him one of the most coveted players in Europe. Under Xabi Alonso, he developed from highly rated prospect into a major attacking force. His 37 goal involvements in 2023-24 helped Leverkusen to a domestic double and a place in the Europa League final. He followed that with 30 more contributions the next season, reinforcing his consistency.<\/p>\n
Liverpool were not alone in pursuing him. Real Madrid and Manchester City were also interested, while Bayern Munich were left frustrated by a rare failure to land one of the Bundesliga\u2019s standout talents. Wirtz, however, only wanted Liverpool.<\/p>\n
The adaptation has been difficult. Liverpool\u2019s decline under Slot, the struggles of those around him and the usual adjustment to a new league can all be cited as factors, but his output has still fallen well short of expectations. It took two months for him to record a goal or assist in a competitive match, before a pair of assists against Eintracht Frankfurt. He then waited another two months for his first Premier League goal involvement, an assist against Tottenham Hotspur.<\/p>\n
That moment sparked a brief upturn. Before February, he added six goals and two assists and won Liverpool\u2019s Player of the Month award in January. But the form did not last, and over the final four months he managed only one goal and two assists.<\/p>\n
The World Cup offered another chance to recover rhythm, and his return of three assists was tempered by Germany\u2019s shock early exit to Paraguay. With an extended preseason under Andoni Iraola, progress was expected, yet the early signs remain modest. He leads Liverpool for ground covered, but has only one assist in his opening six league matches.<\/p>\n
Public backing from Iraola and Klopp has not stopped the criticism, including from Jamie Carragher, who said: \u201cThat was one of the poorest I\u2019ve ever seen him in a Liverpool shirt,\u201d and added: \u201cThe reason I worry is, I don\u2019t think Wirtz is in poor form since he came to Liverpool. I actually think what we\u2019re seeing is what he is.\u201d<\/p>\n
Wirtz remains a gifted technician, but the Premier League has so far restricted his impact far more than Liverpool expected.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Wirtz arrived with huge expectations, but his Liverpool impact has so far fallen far short.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20269,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[175,172],"tags":[1836,180,182],"class_list":["post-20270","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-liverpool","category-epl","tag-2026-27-premier-league","tag-player-news","tag-transfers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20270","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20270"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20270\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20269"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}