Jamie Carragher has called for Liverpool to drop Florian Wirtz from the starting XI after the German struggled in the 3-0 defeat to Manchester City at Anfield. The Sky Sports pundit, speaking on the Gary Neville podcast, said the £116.5m signing offers no goal threat and should not be playing ahead of Ryan Gravenberch.
Carragher's criticism after Man City defeat
Enzo Maresca's side won 3-0 after Ryan Gravenberch was sent off just after the hour mark. Erling Haaland, Jeremy Doku and Rayan Cherki were among the goals for the visitors on a disappointing afternoon for Andoni Iraola's side.
Carragher, who had previously criticised Wirtz after Liverpool's last game at Bournemouth, said: "I'm going to go back to Florian Wirtz, because I was critical of him after the last game Liverpool played at Bournemouth. I was then criticised a little bit by Liverpool supporters for putting a negative slant on it. But what I did say was it could be the last hope if Jurgen Klopp could get his arm around him when he was with Germany."
Wirtz's lack of goal threat
Carragher noted that Wirtz played well for Germany under Klopp but has not delivered for Liverpool. He said: "He has come here today, I'm looking at the game with no [Alexander] Isak and no [Cody] Gakpo, our two best attackers this season. We need [Bradley] Barcola and we need Wirtz to step up and help [Victor] Munoz and [Lewis] Koumas at the top of the pitch. Koumas and Munoz were better than the two £100m players."
He added: "That can't be right. It's not right. It wasn't a decision for anyone in the stadium when Liverpool went down to 10 men. And the big bright spark was [Ryan] Gravenberch. He started badly and was taken out of the team. There is no way Wirtz should be playing ahead of Gravenberch. What Florian Wirtz is doing for Liverpool is not enough right now. He's played 55, 60 games for Liverpool."
Carragher's verdict on Wirtz's future
Carragher compared Wirtz's situation to Barcola's, saying: "If we were looking at Barcola, he has played four or five. You would want more but hold your horses. If you were critical of him, it would be over the top, but not the guy that has played 60 games."
He concluded: "He shouldn't be in the Liverpool team right now. I don't want to hammer Liverpool players. But we're not saying this after five-ten games, we're saying this after 50-60 games. Wirtz never looks like scoring a goal. You don't come away thinking he missed chances or he worked the goalkeeper. There was absolutely nothing today where you thought he put someone through, or nearly scored. There's absolutely no goal threat whatsoever."
