Wayne Rooney has publicly questioned how Florian Wirtz fits into Arne Slot’s Liverpool setup after a slow start to the season. Wirtz has contributed one assist, registered in the Community Shield defeat to Crystal Palace, and was left on the bench for the 2\u20131 win over Everton. The player has acknowledged speaking to Slot about his adaptation to English football.<\/p>\n
On his BBC show, Rooney argued that Wirtz unsettles Liverpool’s balance and pointed to internal competition among new signings and established members of the squad. He said: \u201cI think he\u2019s played okay, but when you sign so many players like Liverpool have, and they\u2019ve signed basically a whole new front line while also having Mo Salah there as well, then they\u2019re all competing,\u201d Rooney said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd I think Wirtz, he\u2019s the one who\u2019s probably not doing as well. He\u2019s got so much ability but for me, I don\u2019t see where he gets into the team. It was a lot of money and I think Wirtz actually damages the balance of Liverpool , how they play. But he\u2019s a top player and I\u2019m sure he will get better, of course he will. But he\u2019s had a slow start and I think there\u2019s no denying that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rooney added context about adaptation and tactical fit: \u201cI\u2019ve seen players come into this league and it takes time. For me, it\u2019s not the price tag, it\u2019s not the player and his ability. I don\u2019t see where he fits into what Liverpool do in that system.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, is he a third midfield player? For me, no, he\u2019s more of an attacking player. So if I have to choose between him and Szoboszlai, then I choose Szoboszlai.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dominik Szoboszlai made 36 appearances as an attacking midfielder last season, contributing 14 goal involvements (six goals, eight assists). To accommodate Wirtz, Szoboszlai has been moved from his favoured No. 10 role and this season has even been used at right back to cover for an injury suffered by Jeremie Frimpong. From that position he produced a notable performance against Arsenal, scoring the winning goal with a sumptuous free-kick.<\/p>\n
Slot also faces selection decisions up front. The signings of Alexander Isak and Hugo Ekitik\u00e9 from Eintracht Frankfurt create competing demands for minutes. Ekitik\u00e9 has suggested a front two and has enjoyed a fine start to his Liverpool career despite being sent off in the Carabao Cup for taking off his shirt, while Isak has yet to find form after a limited pre-season at Newcastle.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Wayne Rooney doubts how Florian Wirtz fits into Arne Slot’s Liverpool, highlighting tactical strain..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3430,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[175,172],"tags":[1081,195,223],"class_list":["post-3431","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-liverpool","category-epl","tag-adaptation","tag-alexander-isak","tag-dominik-szoboszlai"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3431","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=3431"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3431\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3430"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3431"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3431"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3431"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}