Empire of the Kop
·8 May 2024
James Pearce shares what Darwin Nunez ‘has been told numerous times’ by Liverpool staff
James Pearce shares what Darwin Nunez ‘has been told numerous times’ by Liverpool staff | OneFootball
Darwin Nunez’s recent Instagram activity has made headlines, with the striker deleting all Liverpool-related photos from his profile following the 4-2 win over Tottenham on Sunday.
It’s inevitably led to speculation over his future at the club, as well as suggestions that he was scorned by an influx of abusive messages on social media platforms following a barren run of form.
OneFootball Videos
Speaking on the Walk On podcast, James Pearce has claimed that the 24-year-old has been repeatedly advised by staff at Anfield to give online trolls a wide berth for his own good.
The Athletic journalist revealed: “Darwin Nunez has been told numerous times by people at Liverpool to ignore that kind of thing. Don’t even look at it. I think especially last season, when things were tough, he was reading stuff online and it was really hurting him.”
It’s become a depressing feature of modern football, and of the modern world in general, that people feel compelled to delete social media posts or even shut down their accounts altogether in the wake of vicious personal abuse from keyboard warriors.
Footballers at Premier League level will always be subjected to constructive criticism, and it comes as part of the territory, but there’s a world of difference between that and being on the receiving end of cowardly messages where a player and/or their family is abused and maybe even threatened.
Unfortunately, Nunez has been the target of scathing assessments from some pundits in this country, and his confidence may well have suffered as he tried to grapple with the expectations which come from a £64m+ transfer to one of the biggest clubs in world football.
Criticism will generally flow in one ear and out the other for elite level players, but they’re not robots, and it must be hard for someone in their 20s (or indeed of any age) to absorb a tidal wave of unforgiving appraisals of their performance levels when they’re constantly in the public’s eyeline to be shot at as an easy target.
Liverpool’s number 9 would be well advised to take a break from social media for a while and give credence to those who matter the most in his life – his teammates and coaching staff, and especially his friends and family.
View publisher imprint
