Andoni Iraola Defends Florian Wirtz's Impact at Liverpool

Andoni Iraola is not interested in spreadsheets. Not when it comes to Florian Wirtz.

Liverpool’s manager has watched the £116m Germany international picked apart for his numbers – one assist, no Premier League goals – and has decided the debate is missing the point. For Iraola, Wirtz’s value is written in Liverpool’s patterns of play, not in the stat lines that trail him off the pitch.

Wirtz’s best work has come on the biggest stage. He shone again in midweek as Liverpool dismantled Atlético Madrid, just as he did at times in last season’s Champions League run. The criticism, though, has focused on the moments when he loses the ball, on the risks he takes between the lines.

Iraola sees something else.

“Flo played very well against Atlético Madrid and I also think he has been unlucky,” he said, pointing back to the disallowed strike against Nottingham Forest – a goal shown live, celebrated, then wiped away by VAR. There have been near-miss assists too, chances created but not finished. On another day, the numbers look very different. The manager refuses to let that define the conversation.

This is his line in the sand: Liverpool’s No 10 is there to make the team play.

“Whether a striker scores a lot of goals or he doesn’t, you have to look at the performances. Does he help us to play well? Yes,” Iraola said. “Someone will score the goals and someone will give the assists. I am not too focused on numbers.”

That last point cuts against the modern tide. Football has become an industry of metrics – expected this, progressive that – and Iraola knows his players feel that pressure. “Nowadays everything is about numbers, everyone tells players you have to assist, you have to score goals,” he said. His message to Wirtz is simpler: orchestrate, connect, tilt the pitch in Liverpool’s favour. If the collective structure is right, the goals will fall to someone.

Against Atlético, Wirtz did exactly that. One moment summed it up: a perfectly weighted pass that carved Diego Simeone’s defence open and left Bradley Barcola with a gilt‑edged chance. It went begging, but the vision and timing underlined why Iraola is so adamant about judging the 23-year-old on influence rather than end product.

A new front line, a new language

Part of the story is change. Liverpool’s wingers have been overhauled and the attacking ecosystem around Wirtz is still taking shape. Iraola did not shy away from that.

“There is an argument to make that the wingers have changed more than anywhere else,” he said. The arrival of Barcola and fellow new signing Victor Muñoz has given Liverpool different tools in the final third. New weapons, as he put it. New runs, new spaces, new habits.

At the centre of it all sits Wirtz, tasked with learning where each forward wants the ball, how they like to receive it, when they explode into space or drop short. It is a process that rarely shows up in early-season statistics but often dictates how quickly an attack catches fire.

“With Florian, he is key for us,” Iraola said. “I am not worried because he will quickly learn where Victor prefers the ball or where Bradley prefers the ball.” The early signs, he argued, are already there. Barcola was only in his second game against Atlético, yet the pair combined with the easy understanding of players who have been working together for far longer.

The numbers will come if that relationship keeps growing. Iraola is convinced of it. For now, he is prepared to take the heat on behalf of a playmaker still bedding into a new-look front line, still learning the movements of his runners, still judged too harshly by a scoreboard that tells only part of the story.

Liverpool bought Wirtz to be the brain of their attack, not just another line in the goals column. Iraola is determined to let him be exactly that.