Arne Slot says he found Darwin Nunez’s behaviour ‘difficult’ to accept during Liverpool’s draw with Aston Villa. The Reds boss was critical of the forward’s reaction to missing a big chance at Villa Park.
Nunez skied an effort just in front of goal as Liverpool were held to another 2-2 stalemate. Slot was unhappy that the Uruguayan allowed the setback to impact his performance.
In a brutal assessment of Nunez’s display after his 69th-minute miss with the score at 2-2, Slot says his forward did not work hard enough.
Slot said: “I can accept every miss, especially from a player who scored two very important goals versus Brentford. I would prefer him to score but the word ‘chance’ says it all.
“I can accept it but what was harder was his behaviour after that chance, it got too much in his head and he wasn’t the usual Darwin that works his backside off.
“He was too disappointed after missing it and that is why he was a fraction short. It is always best to have Endo [Wataru]’s mindset and he keeps going and is always ready, not many can do this. It’s not about the chance, it is the 20 mins after it I want to talk to Darwin about.
“Going 2-1 down versus Villa, which was against the run of play. I said at half-time I can show them the chances they created, I told them it wasn’t logical, so I said keep going and we will have chances. Too many times this season we have missed so many chances. We haven’t stolen many points, most of the time we’ve got what we deserve.”
Nunez has endured a tough time at Anfield since joining from Benfica in the summer of 2022. His Liverpool career has been punctuated by some big misses. The Reds have largely relied on Mohamed Salah for goals.
Liverpool face a tough clash against Manchester City on Sunday amid a small wobble in the Premier League title race. Their 2-2 draws against Villa and Everton came either side of a narrow 2-1 win over struggling Wolves.
City do not pose the same enormous challenge as previous years but will be buoyed by a 4-0 thrashing of Newcastle last weekend. However, Pep Guardiola’s side were comfortably beaten 3-1 by Real Madrid in their Champions League play-off second leg in midweek.
It remains to be seen whether Erling Haaland and Kevin De Bruyne – who both remained on the bench in Spain due to injury concerns – will be fit for the visit of Liverpool.
