The villains on the pitch at Kenilworth Road for the Reds this weekend, when Liverpool could barely muster a one-goal draw against Luton Town, were Video Arbitration (VAR) and striker Darwin Nunez. The Uruguayan attacker has drawn harsh criticism for his massive error in front of goal, which would have meant 1-0 for the Merseysiders in the 70th minute.
Darwin would be a much more complete striker if he could record all the shots in which he had the goal at his mercy and without the goalkeeper protection of the rival goal post. However, even though Darwin Nunez has already had a few of these opportunities missed this season, this player is not the one who has recorded the most errors thus far. The shot that Nunez took was high and significantly diverted from the rival goal, and this caused all kinds of comments on social media.
Based on data obtained from the social media platform, the Anything Liverpool account was able to share with that Ollie Watkins of Aston Villa, and Manchester City star Erling Haaland, have also had the same amount of mistakes. Watkins and Haland do, in fact, rank among the forwards with the most minutes played with their teams in the Premier League this season because they have both been active on matchdays thus far, in contrast to Darwin Nunez who has played in one fewer game overall, and might lack alertness, as a result.
Nunez is much underrated
While it’s true that Darwin’s individual mistakes have continued to affect some of the team’s outcomes, it appears that one game has been sufficient to undo a number of the positive perceptions that existed prior to the start of the match against a Luton Town team that not only made Darwin but the great majority of Liverpool players appear awful. Darwin had prior to Luton match been acknowledged for his outstanding growth this season.