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Florian and the (Slot) Machine

The fees these days just seem quite random.

I kinda feel sorry for Wirtz. Finally makes his big move and it turns out he’s chosen a dumpster fire. That said, I’m not seeing generational talent so far. Perhaps it would be different at another team, hopefully will be for us next season.
 
Bundesliga attackers tend to get wildly overhyped because the games are so open. Wirtz is clearly an excellent footballer, but it feels reasonable to place him more in the £70m to £80m bracket. When you factor in that Cherki cost £36m, has adapted quickly, and is already putting up strong numbers, even that might be generous. Cherki was the bigger risk, but arguably the more “Liverpool” type of signing, and he would have freed up at least £60M to address the winger issue we are so obviously short in. Hindsight and all that.


This is not a dig at Wirtz. He is more a victim of the hype machine than anything else, and carrying that level of expectation in a dysfunctional team cannot be easy. I've no doubt he'll be a very good player for us, but a super-star player you build a team around? The jury's out and will be for some time. He's got all the technical ability, but whether he has the physicality and shooting ability to achieve the numbers we need, I suspect not; however, anything's possible, though. Look at Coutinho - that little wizard made the PL his bitch for a while. We need Florian to do the same.
 
You are way to critical here Momo.
You’re like someone who has dug a hole and keeps digging
Am I? It’s January and how may 7/10 games has he given us? He had this massive rep and he’s been mostly meh.
 
He’s a dud. If we had paid £40m I’d be disappointed, at £115m he goes down as our worst ever signing.
 
Bundesliga attackers tend to get wildly overhyped because the games are so open. Wirtz is clearly an excellent footballer, but it feels reasonable to place him more in the £70m to £80m bracket. When you factor in that Cherki cost £36m, has adapted quickly, and is already putting up strong numbers, even that might be generous. Cherki was the bigger risk, but arguably the more “Liverpool” type of signing, and he would have freed up at least £60M to address the winger issue we are so obviously short in. Hindsight and all that.


This is not a dig at Wirtz. He is more a victim of the hype machine than anything else, and carrying that level of expectation in a dysfunctional team cannot be easy. I've no doubt he'll be a very good player for us, but a super-star player you build a team around? The jury's out and will be for some time. He's got all the technical ability, but whether he has the physicality and shooting ability to achieve the numbers we need, I suspect not; however, anything's possible, though. Look at Coutinho - that little wizard made the PL his bitch for a while. We need Florian to do the same.
funny coutinho is exactly who i was thinking about watching him last game and i was trying to work out if it was fair to compare to him to the £7m kid that joined from inter or the £140 turd that floated to barcelona.

he’s not comparing that favourably to phil right now because we paid the price for the latter and are receiving the former
 
I saw someone else on TikTok making a similar comparison. I was going to share it then got distracted by beer and Pringles.
 
He and Ekitike are worth watching with a football sometimes, and we usually look worse when he's not on the pitch. Is he worth the price? Definitely not so far, but he wasn't bought for just now, and I don't think this team is going to make anyone look very valuable at the moment.
 
Yeah he's pretty much the best of a bad bunch at the minute isn't he? Also, he's improving. Not a worry at the minute.
I think when you consider that more or less EVERYONE is playing below what we know they are capable of, it's really hard to gauge just how he is performing or why. I think he's doing decent, but he can frustrate too, but he definitely has the football brain and you can see what he's trying to do, he can be quite sloppy though too.
 
I have not been that impressed with him but it is difficult to judge a player in our team this season. Macca barely resembles a professional footballer.
 
He was always always going to take a long time to adapt and never be as good as some claimed (generational talent in the mould of Messi and Ronaldo if I remember correctly).

He’s improving but there is a risk the money spent on him and Isak might cost us everything.
 
The difference is that Slot and Edwards clearly had a coherent plan for how to get the best out of Wirtz on paper. It was convincing enough for him to choose us over Bayern, with Florian and his dad fully on board, so there was some alignment in a way there never was with Brodge and Edwards. The problem was what happened around Wirtz. The midfield never settled, with Gravenberch and Mac Allister struggling for form, Szoboszlai being moved around too much, and Salah’s output dropping off. It piled pressure on Wirtz to deliver straight away.

I do not think Wirtz has much reason to take issue with Slot personally. Slot has consistently backed him, given him plenty of minutes, and even when used on the left, he has generally been allowed freedom. Most of us also agreed Slot was right to move him out of a three-man midfield that was haemorrhaging goals. To be fair to Wirtz, he has kept his head down, continued to plug away, dealt with Salah's selfishness and the team's poor finishing, and has generally been the second-best player to Ekitike all season.

I think he's going to be a bit like Modric in that he'll make any team look and function far better, but he'll still need some superstars in the team to do the worldly stuff on occasion. We look to have one in Ekitike, but if we assume that only one of Ekitike and Isak is starting, then it's safe to say we're going to need some real quality, pace and goal-scoring threat out wide and some far, far better patterns of play than we've seen this season. He's crying out for players to get in behind and actually stretch the play.
 
The problem is we're so horrifically unbalanced when everyone is fit that wirtz is either getting his toes trod on or there's no willing runners for him.

We just need to find a long term plan that maximises him, whatever 9 plays, and wingers. There's so little pace other than Frimpong it's scary
 
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