‘Klopp didn’t foresee this’: Merson says Darwin Nunez is causing issues for £34m Liverpool player

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One Liverpool teammate causes Mo Salah a problem, says Paul Merson. It’s a problem Jurgen Klopp ‘didn’t foresee’.

Paul Merson believes Darwin Nunez creates a problem for Mohamed Salah simply by being in the Liverpool team. It’s one that Jurgen Klopp apparently didn’t see coming, says the pundit.

“Liverpool were at their absolute best when Salah could make his runs inside,” he told Sportskeeda. “The problem now is that he can’t do that anymore with Nunez occupying that space up front and might need to change his game.

“Klopp didn’t foresee this problem, and will need to find a way around it – it’s just a little blip for the side.”

The Mo Salah problem

This ‘problem’ is particularly highlighted as Salah came off the bench against Rangers and scored a six-minute hattrick. He did it while Nunez was sat on the bench, with the Uruguayan having scored himself before going off.

But we think this is an over simplification. Certainly, Nunez makes different runs to Roberto Firmino or even Sadio Mané. He looks to get in behind himself at all times and isn’t entirely comfortable at dropping deep to vacate space for others.

Salah would typically run into that space and threaten. But to say Klopp didn’t foresee this is false. There’s a reason the Egyptian has been out on the flank so often this season – he’s stretching play for Nunez. The problem is that Liverpool are struggling badly to control teams and push them back.

If they could do that, Salah would be able to drift inside and get in the box around Nunez. When Liverpool don’t do it, Salah is out in his starting position very wide. That’s less a problem with Nunez and more a problem with the Reds just not dominating games as they did.

For starters, Salah’s problems continued while Nunez was out of the team. Liverpool just need to find a system that gets their star closer to goal while they struggle to control teams. And they may have found that on Wednesday as Salah came on as a striker to score a six-minute hattrick.

Perhaps, then, Klopp could even try Nunez and Salah as a striker-pairing. We’d like to see teams try and contain that.