Jamie Carragher has made his thoughts clear on Liverpool striker Divock Origi, who he has claimed is “nowhere near good enough” for his favoured role.
The Belgian has been favoured over Taki Minamino for minutes this term, with the 26-year-old sent out on loan to Southampton for the remainder of the season.
“If you look at Liverpool’s attacking players they don’t have a striker. Jota is not a striker, same with Mane, same with Salah,” the Monday Night Football presenter told Sky Sports’ Super 6 podcast. “They have Divock Origi but he’s nowhere near good enough. And he a lot of the time plays out wide, because he can’t play as a centre-forward.”
Origi has been used sparingly by Jurgen Klopp and, one might surmise, for good reason, considering his rather dismal return of two goal contributions in his last 15 appearances for the club in all competitions.
With Diogo Jota out injured, Liverpool have lacked that vital spark off the bench to pick up a lax performance and, ultimately, grab match-winning goals.
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The 25-year-old has come up with the goods before where needed – most notably in our Champions League-winning campaign of 2019 – but his lacklustre outings up front have led fans to adopt a similar line of thought to Carragher on the centre-forward.
Favoured due to his size and aerial threat, the former Lille man has come across this season as somewhat one-dimensional and lacking that crucial bit of dynamism that makes the likes of Salah and co. stand out as some of Europe’s deadliest forwards.
We don’t play with a traditional striker, with Klopp preferring the unpredictable movement of his free-ranging frontline.
Should Origi wish to reignite his Liverpool career, he’ll need to quickly demonstrate that he can still fit within that ideal.