Thierry Henry believes Darwin Nunez is under pressure to succeed Sadio Mane at Liverpool
Darwin Nunez joined Liverpool for a potential club-record transfer fee of £85m last summer. After enduring a tough start to his Reds’ career, the 23-year-old Uruguayan striker now has somewhat eased into life in England and appears to have found his scoring boots.
In 15 appearances across all competitions, Nunez has seven goals and one assist to his name. The striker also scored in the Reds’ 2-0 win against Napoli in the UEFA Champions League last night, capping off a good cameo off the bench. In recent games, Darwin’s movement in front of the goal has been noteworthy and he is looking increasingly confident.
However, he always carries the burden of replacing Sadio Mane at the club, who departed for Bayern Munich in the summer. The Senegalese, in 269 appearances for the Reds across all competitions, scored 120 goals and made 48 assists. The void he left at the club is understandably, quite huge.
Former Arsenal striker and pundit Thierry Henry believes that it is tough to replace a figure like Mane at the club and Darwin is just easing into that role. Here is what he said via the Metro:
“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.”
Mane, during his time at Merseyside, was one of Klopp’s most trusted men and played a huge role in Liverpool’s resurgence as a European powerhouse. Replacing such a player is certainly not an easy task, and Nunez is learning that the hard way.
Nunez going well at Liverpool
Despite his slow start to the campaign, the Uruguayan is now looking the part and more game time from this point onwards will only further cement his role in the squad.
Even though he has been guilty of missing a few easy chances, Nunez is regularly getting into goal-scoring positions. Slowly but surely, his performances will show results in terms of goals and assists as well.
Becoming a replacement for a mainstay like Sadio is certainly no easy job and Darwin will hope that he eases into the task and make sure that he performs week in and week out.
At this point, Liverpool needs to carry their European form into their Premier League in order to make sure that they finish in the top four. As of yet, they have won just four of the opening 12 games in the league.
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The Reds will face Tottenham Hotspur in the Premier League this weekend, and the fans would hope to see Darwin at his best in a game Liverpool certainly needs to win at all costs. It remains to be seen if Nunez will be the difference maker on the night.
