Arne Slot comes to the defence of Florian Wirtz after early scrutiny

Florian Wirtz has found himself on the end of early criticism, and Arne Slot sought to defend his No. 7, who is “part of a team that is number one in the league at the moment.”

By no fault of his own, Wirtz’s £116 million price tag has invited early scrutiny as he adjusts to English football.

The No. 7 has had a muted start to life at Anfield, without a goal or an assist as Liverpool’s most advanced midfielder, but he has created the joint-most chances (8) alongside Cody Gakpo.

Wirtz has started all four games but has yet to complete 90 minutes, with Slot withdrawing the German despite chasing a result deep into each Premier League fixture.

But Slot came to the 22-year-old’s defence when asked about Wirtz’s early form and his adjustment period.

“I put that down to Bournemouth. I put that down to Newcastle. I put that down to Arsenal. I put that down to a team we faced this weekend that only conceded 14 goals last season,” he said.

“If it’s correct, I don’t know, but someone told me today that’s the first time in 18 months that Burnley lost a home game. But it tells you how hard it is to play these games, which is normal.

“There’s so much focus on our new signings, especially the pundits that don’t favour us, but some other clubs! They cannot stop talking about £450 million, I repeat £450 million.

“But they always forget the £300 million that we’ve sold for!

“These players that we’ve brought in are indeed a lot of money, but they are playing now together with players that are worth the same amount of money.

“Yes, if we want to strengthen the squad we need almost to spend that much money. If we sell Dominik Szoboszlai tomorrow, he would be worth 100 million as well.

“There’s so much focus on Florian, but the ones that have stayed in the team haven’t scored four goals or 12 assists as well.

“He’s been part of a team, Florian, that is on top of the league and that won four games.

“He’s part of the team that won against Newcastle, that won against Arsenal, where the team last season didn’t win away at Newcastle and didn’t win at home against Arsenal.

“It’s the way you want to look at it. Yes, he hasn’t scored four goals or 12 assists in the first four games – but for me, that’s down to the quality we faced.

“He’s part of a team that is number one in the league at the moment.”

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