Dietmar Hamann has set the timer on Florian Wirtz. If Liverpool’s most expensive signing “doesn’t start influencing games in the next three or four weeks”, the former Germany midfielder told Yahoo Sports, transfer chatter will follow the international break.

Anfield’s position is different. Liverpool paid £116m to Bayer Leverkusen for Wirtz in 2025 and tied him to a contract through 2030, and the club will not cash in cheaply on a player they still see as central to the project.

The Leverkusen benchmark

The numbers tell the awkward story. Wirtz produced seven goals and as many assists in his debut Premier League season, a drop from the 20-plus goal contributions per campaign he had returned across his final two years at Bayer Leverkusen. His summer offered no reset either: at the 2026 World Cup, Wirtz started all four of Germany’s matches and left with three assists and no goals as the team went out on penalties to Paraguay in the round of 32.

The 2026-27 season has started in the same key. Wirtz played the full 90 minutes of Liverpool’s 0-0 draw with Fulham on 12 September without a decisive touch, in a match Andoni Iraola admitted had been an offensive problem for his side.

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“I think it’s the first game since I’m here, I think we’ve had problems to create chances, to score goals, to make the difference offensively,” Iraola said.

Szoboszlai and the missing pass

Journalist David Lynch, speaking on Anfield Index’s Media Matters podcast, argued that Wirtz is running himself out of the game rather than freezing in it. Wirtz covered 12.4km against Fulham, a figure Lynch called counter-productive.

“I wonder whether the amount of distance he’s covered at times is kind of taken away from his freshness when he gets on the ball.”

Lynch’s other complaint sits with the players around Wirtz. Liverpool’s midfield, he said, is not finding him in the pockets where he does his best work.

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“Szoboszlai should be finding Wirtz in the ten. They should be finding him in the ten, ten, fifteen times a game.”

Hamann’s Verón warning

Hamann’s frustration is more familiar. He reached for the Juan Sebastián Verón warning: as Hamann put it, an elite midfielder who came “lauded as the best midfield player” and “lasted one season and went back to Italy.” His verdict on the German’s remit was blunt.

“He’s not there to win balls, he’s there to set up goals and score goals.”

Jermaine Pennant sits at the other end of the argument. The former Liverpool winger has urged patience, noting that players “in the past take a season-and-a-half really to find their feet” in England and that Liverpool need a creator of Wirtz’s profile in their squad regardless of the current run.

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Iraola’s own side is unbeaten but has taken only six points from its first four Premier League fixtures. Bradley Barcola, given his first full Premier League start on the left against Fulham, has arrived to widen Liverpool’s attacking options, not to replace the £116m playmaker in the number-ten role.

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