Luka Modric is prefabricated like Liverpool light-weight Florian Wirtz and also he was a “f***ing monster”. Carries out the German have what it swipes to sheen in the Premier League?
That’s the sight of previous Bayer Leverkusen, Tottenham Hotspur and also Manchester Unified demonstrator Dimitar Berbatov, who played via Modric at Energizes.
Florian Wirtz’s Premier League torment: Fulcra statistics
- 0 aspiration involvements in 9 aesthetic dazzles (6 propels)
- A jumble more yellow cards (1) than purposes and also assists fused (0)
- 1.1 concocted for led purposes
- 15 pivot enacts – 11th in the Premier League
- Lone 15 snag-ons dared (59th), 7 finished (47th)
Having price an first £100million from Bayer Leverkusen, it goes without moral that Wirtz’s practicalities in a Liverpool shirt have fallen nicely listed under guesses.
Certainly zero aspiration involvements in 9 Premier League matches have added to a pathetic get started to his Liverpool career, yet the Reds’ practicalities in existing weeks have almost led Wirtz creep out of the spotlight, via colleagues such as Virgil van Dijk, Ibrahima Konate, Alexis Mac Allister, Alexander Isak and also Milos Kerkez lug in criticism.
It’s now four Premier League beats on the bounce for Arne Slot’s side, who are 7th in the table, and also while Wirtz’s practicalities are get started to go under the radar a piece, his signing – and also how it has switched Liverpool strategically – lingers to be a systematic speaking time.
The Premier League winners are much more responsive at the ago, via Kerkez, Konate and also Van Dijk all out of form, and also the midfielders in front of them not issuing sufficient defensive wrap up – something that stems from Wirtz’s addition to the crew.
The 22-year-ratty jobs hard off the ball, yet he’s undeniably more of a overindulgence gamer than opposite other Liverpool assaulting midfielders, such as Dominik Szoboszlai and also Curtis Jones.
Florian Wirtz: The next Luka Modric?
There’s zero doubting Wirtz’s technical aptitude, and also Berbatov is avid it will possibly surpass his scarcity of physicality, recommending out Luka Modric as an instance of a allegedly light-weight gamer who executes like a “f***ing monster” on the peddle.
Any kind of devastating suggestions about Modric’s build has constantly worried rate and also capability, yet he’s clearly in optimal physical form; he’s 40 and also still tinkering for AC bloody Milan.
“By the way, I love him. He’s a wondrous gamer. He will possibly be unforgettable, trust fund me,” he claimed on Rio Ferdinand’s YouTube network.
“Doning any type of luck, he will possibly be individual,” Berbatov reoccurred.
“Doning any type of luck, he’ll have nice users about him, spokesperson, family, whatever. Doning any type of luck, the instructor exams his idiosyncrasy like everybody exams him. I’m sure that everybody exams his idiosyncrasy, and also they’ll impart him that time that he needs to suit into the crew. And I reassure you, he’s attending be a triumphes.
“The way he exams football, how he aesthetic dazzles for the void, how he recognizes how to position himself, the touches on the ball, the improvisation, the eye for the develop and also for the purposes. Of course, a individual can say that his physique is not that nice for the Premier League.
“But then you can readily investigate the nice gamers of his position, like Modric, in addition unchanged build. Modric. F***ing monster. It’s unforgettable. So impart him time. I assume he’s attending be unforgettable for Liverpool.”
‘What a wastage of coinage dollars!’ 😬💰
The Brentford fanatics let Florian Wirtz have it after being substituted for Joe Gomez.#StanSportAU #PremierLeague image.twitter.com/W7Zzxl4wqH
— Stan Sport Football (@StanSportFC) October 28, 2025
The jury will possibly be out on Wirtz for a while, yet Berbatov’s faith purchases suggestions to Liverpool fanatics after a made complex get started.
Modric’s adjust from Dinamo Zagreb to Energizes was disturbingly unlike from Wirtz’s summer season tramp. The Croatian joined a smaller bar for £15m in his first taste of a optimal-five league.
Although he was 26 when he joined Real Madrid, that tramp truly feels more beefy — particularly after he was tagged the worst La Liga signing of the 2012/13 period. He funnelled out Madrid fanatics eat their words and also went on to come to be a bar tale and also Ballon d’Or winner in 2018.
If Berbatov’s words are anything to go by, the firmament’s the limit for Wirtz, who can yet fetch from a cruel get started to come to be one of the most unadventurous and also secure gamers in the planet.
Why is Florian Wirtz struggling for Liverpool?
There are some things statistics can’t define, like being a 22-year-ratty relocating to a new-fashioned rural for an astronomical transfer price, or joining a side undergoing systematic adjust after a flurry of big-coinage dollars arrivals.
Liverpool started the project via five success from five, so attributing their battles to Wirtz’s insufficient form doesn’t lug out feeling, yet the crew’s dip has lengthy his made complex functioning out-in period.
One pivot statistic that emphasizes the irresoluteness is modern enacts grabbed. Wirtz uncolored 11.7 per 90 in the Bundesliga last period yet merely 6.73 for Liverpool, proving he’s not acquiring the ball in high-hazard units in between the jabbers.
His touches per 90 have in addition ditched from 77.8 to 56.3 — proof he’s much less contained despite Slot discarding defensive soundness to suit him.
And when he executes have the ball, he’s drastically been unsuitable, registering merely 1.1 concocted for assists in the Premier League so far.
Berbatov’s pointers to Wirtz is a breath of fresh atmosphere
Berbatov in addition drew on his disturbingly own astonish, having escaped Leverkusen for the Premier League in floater of his prime. And he was hardly a gamer known for raw athleticism.
“In my pill, I was again having vacillations,” he claimed. “The same process was snagging place when I attended Leverkusen. The same point. Given that in Leverkusen, in the get started, it didn’t wrap up pretty nicely. I necessary to be individual.”
“But again, vacillations. Now in Energizes, again, new-fashioned atmosphere, again, new-fashioned users, new-fashioned language, new-fashioned everything. Again, the things were snagging gradually to happen for me.
“And again, I was believing, possibly I have to revert. You develop, that devastating believing… Conceivably I have to revert, or Leverkusen, or somewhere else. It’s not functioning here. But that devastating believing that users have the majority of of the time, which is heinous. It’s not a nice way of executing.
“But then, at unchanged time, when I was believing like this, then my opposite other, not personality, yet my opposite other me, was notifying me, ‘zero, zero, zero, zero. You investigate what arised in Leverkusen’.
“Utterly be individual. Buttress functioning. You have the idiosyncrasy. You deserve to be here. You longed something to adjust. Now you’re here. Now be wayward. Be individual. Buttress functioning. Not resting. It’s not attending loss like this on your lap. Job. Wily or hard. Threat to develop when, which when, and also job-related. And it will possibly happen.
“So I was motivating myself. At unchanged time, I dared to sabotage myself. And you basically twinge to attend your unadventurous and also secure place, your unadventurous and also secure atmosphere. But you have to have that suggestions and also that aspiration in you as nicely to received rid of the phobia. So my aspiration was bigger than my phobia.”
It’s refreshing to listen to some proactive, educational punditry from a previous Manchester Unified gamer — none of this “Ballon d’Or, Ballon d’Or, Ballon d’Or” nonsense.
