Lothar Matthaus calls out Jamie Carragher & Co. over “unfair” criticism of Florian Wirtz

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“I have some contacts in England and regularly hear that he’s putting in very good performances. At Liverpool, he is involved in sequences that subsequently lead to goals.” For just a reminder of what Jamie Carragher recently told Sky Sports back in September: “I don’t see how he’s going to hurt you.

And in some way, the price tag for that type of player should be half of what Liverpool have paid.“The worry for Wirtz now is that his performances so far, or what he’s given Liverpool, is so low. Even if he improves a bit and gets there, it’s still not what Liverpool thought they were getting.”In our former centre-half’s defence, Wirtz has simply not put up numbers on the board that reasonably reflect his £116m package.

There’s just the one Premier League assist in six games (across all competitions) following a tally of 17 goal contributions in 49 games in the 2025/26 campaign.But our analysis of the No.7 has to be more nuanced and go beyond raw numbers – it has to place him within the environment he’s working in, rather than analysing him as an individual footballer. But our analysis of the No.7 has to be more nuanced and go beyond raw numbers – it has to place him within the environment he’s working in, rather than analysing him as an individual footballer.Liverpool won’t get the best out of Wirtz until they’re more balanced(Photo by Michael Regan/Getty Images)The point has been fairly made that Andoni Iraola is doing the best he can with an extremely unbalanced squad.But the fact of the matter is that this isn’t just impacting the Basque’s ability to coach this Liverpool side into form, but also Florian Wirtz’s ability to be impactful in English football.The player himself has already alluded to the fact that he’s got very little space to work with on Merseyside; not simply due to the intense nature of Premier League football but also because his teammates aren’t platforming him well enough.And it’s no surprise as to why when we’re looking at a frontline every single week that seems reliant on the combination play between Cody Gakpo and Alexander Isak.