Former Gunners’ French ace and Premier League legend Thierry Henry certainly knows what is required to score goals at the highest level and has now offered some words of advice for Liverpool’s marquee summer signing Darwin Nunez. Arsenal icon Thierry Henry believes Darwin Nunez is trying a bit too hard to fill the shoes of Liverpool legend Sadio Mane at Anfield this season.
The 23-year-old Uruguayan joined the red half of Merseyside for big bucks last summer as Liverpool parted ways with £85million besides an array of add-ons to sign Nunez from Benfica. And even at this early juncture he has been guilty of spurning some glorious chances already this term, which has heaped pressure on the striker to perform.
Henry has explained that while he feels Nunez is showing some positive signs, he is guilty of trying to “overdo it” in front of goal and could already be crumbling under the pressure of aiming to match Mane’s impact.
Nunez netted Liverpool’s second during their 2-0 home win over Napoli on Tuesday night and Henry discussed his efforts after the game.
“I think he needs confidence, and the confidence that I’m talking about is when you are at a club and feel like you’re going to play week in and week out, you’re a bit more cold in front of goal,” the Frenchman told CBS Sports.
“Because he wants to please so much and do so much and he wants to wow the Liverpool fans, sometimes he rushes it. He gets the ball and he rushes it instead of controlling it, going back on his right foot and finishing clean.
“I went through that. When you arrive as a big signing and just overdo it at times. Coming in after Sadio Mane, that’s not easy to do and you just overdo it instead of being calm, cool and finishing.”
Henry in fact took it a step farther and actually went on to say that he doesn’t feel as if Nunez possesses the same kind of killer instinct as some other Liverpool goal machines of years gone by like Robbie Fowler and discussed how Nunez may not be able to bag goals as prodigiously as the former Reds star did, but has traits more similar to those of fellow ex-Liverpool talisman Luis Suarez.
Nunez is now astride seven goals and two assists across all competitions which is pretty commendable and hardly indicative of a flop signing. Clearly some of the criticism that has been levelled at him has been undeserved, and he can choose to take comfort from the fact that his manager is pleased with his efforts.
Klopp described the striker’s performance against Napoli as “absolutely good”, but actually heaped more praise on him in the aftermath of Saturday’s 2-1 defeat by Leeds.
“Trust me, nobody knows how good Darwin can get, he doesn’t know,” the Reds boss added. “He has to stay fit and be available all the time, we have to work on this, on all different areas.”