It feels like Darwin Nunez is UNHAPPY on the bench for Liverpool - Steve Nicol | ESPN FC

Steve Nicol, Alejandro Moreno, Julien Laurens and Dan Thomas react to Liverpool's 2-0 win over Ipswich Town in Arne Slot's first game as the manager, and then discuss why Darwin Nunez didn't play in the Premier League matchup.

[fwRs]

Safe to say any football player on the bench isnt happy, thanks for enlightening us.

[martinquinn]

If he was happy on the bench, you’d say he doesn’t care and is on his way out

[godwinngoya]

How is the headline about Darwin... when we played brilliant 2nd half and and salah broke another record

[SidneyXda]

F you on about Nicol, pre seasons games against Arsenal, Man U, Seville you can see what Slot is trying to get the players to do. It’s keeping possession when won after a press, not rush into losing the ball again, regaining energy. Also he wants them to go with the long ball when teams press Liverpool defence, with quick one two incisive moves and up to the opposition keeper.

[Rain]

LFC fan here, I don’t care who is happy or UNHAPPY! We won and that is enough. I remember when we drew 2-2 with Fulham away first game of season and when we drew 1-1 away with Luton. Wining first game away is good 👍🏻

[zailkhalsa]

Once again true Liverpool fans will only start worrying when ESPN and Stevie say something positive about the Reds.

[imranarshad]

These guys clearly did not listen to the TNT interview, Slot said they showed them at half-time when a team is playing 1v1, like Ipswich were, don't constantly play it short when you have wingers and attackers play them in but they must then fight for it. It's a myth that all he wants to do is have his players play short just because he said kill them with passing in training once, he has shown he is more flexible than that and is prepared to tell the players to also play longer when the opportunity is right. It's the first game of the season, Darwin was one of the late ones coming back so he's had hardly any football so maybe he's not fit enough yet who knows but bit early to be saying he's unhappy.

[Tiza]

Jota is super underrated and undervalued. Everytime he plays he scores or has an impact. Nunez shouldnt be complaining when somebody like Jota who’s been on the bench for ages takes his place.

[Karmatashii]

Quansah was losing duels and got subbed at half-time, Kloppo would've never done that infact he would've let him play for the full 90 and subbed some other player instead if he did use his subs. People are expecting Lfc trajectory to go down after the manager change but I think its looking onwards and upwards for us under Slott.

[kebbizdrammeh]

Salah dominate the premier league consistently over and over, yet they ignore him 🙄 imagine if Salah is English 😅

[markhand]

thank you klopp for bringing us great players into our team and thanks to edwards for finding the best coach to work with them.

[JR-sjjz]

“Style of play has been with my teams where I worked, I think, always the same, there are a lot of similarities with Jürgen Klopp, with the way they played in the past, and I’m hoping we will see these similarities in the upcoming weeks and months."
"But it sometimes also depends a bit on the players you have. I think we’re trying to find the balance between trying to create chaos at certain moments and trying to keep possession of the ball a bit longer in other moments" - Arne Slot

Of course there were elements of Klopp in the style of play. The coach himself has said on more than one occasion now that we will see similarities in some things. Especially now because the likes of Trent, Mac Allister, Van Dijk etc only played one friendly as they arrived back less than weeks ago. I expected Moreno and Stevie to spout nonsense but a bit disappointed in Jules doing the same. He tends to be on top of such things. Also funny how they mentioned Nunez being unhappy but completely missed that Gomez didn't even make the bench.

[OmbréLeather]

They played this way for most of last season as well. I remember many games last year where they turned it on 2nd half either through subs or starters they found their legs and touch. Darwin coming on late and scoring two in 5 minutes pulling Liverpool out of the fire against Newcastle I believe. I don’t like the slow starts but it seems these players never panic and they know they can grab a win usually.

[derekmain]

Why is not the headline joe Gomez unhappy but Nunez suits the narrative

[scouser]

I expected Nicol as a former professional to not have such a lazy take on Nunez. Jota when fit, is arguably the best finisher in the league. He certainly is at the club. Nunez came back to training barely a week ago. Why on God’s earth would/should Nunez be expected to start over the Portuguese striker?

[smirkfella]

1 game in. 1 win. Arne has a good squad. Who cares if Darwin is unhappy. Us Liverpool fans are on our journey. He's apart of it or not

[BhajanMan]

Playing away at 12:30 has always been a potential banana skin for Liverpool, and BT knows it well. Huge applause for Gravenberch, who stepped up brilliantly as the second pivot alongside Mac Allister.
Steve Nicol on Nunez is just pure lazy, Nunez came back late from Copa America and not up to speed

[mrr]

It's the first game you can't expect everyone should be up to speed and sharpness

[tomlfc]

Stevie’s spot on. If Diogo keeps scoring (he should have had at least a second) then Nunez won’t get a look in. It was telling that Slott bought Gakpo on, Nunez must feel he’s down on the pecking order. That’s the game.

[anuph.]

I love Nunez and I hope he gets minutes against teams that we put aside in the first half cus he needs confidence back and at some point we will need to rly on him, the season is long and filled with games every few days, hope he can find his mojo, we need the Nunez from the few games after his Newcastle heroics when he would just run rampant. He has it in him, look at his Uruguay performance.