Fabio Carvalho has pointed to one match in particular as the moment he knew that he was regarded as a peripheral player at Liverpool.
The attacker joined from Fulham in 2022 and enjoyed a bright start to his time at Anfield, scoring in consecutive Premier League games in his first month at the club.
However, his last top-flight start came in October of that campaign in a defeat to Nottingham Forest, and once he was withdrawn at half-time in a Carabao Cup tie against Manchester City two months later despite finding the net, the penny had well and truly dropped.
In an interview with the Liverpool Echo, Carvalho reflected: “I started that [Forest] game, we didn’t really play that well. After that game, I just didn’t really have that many chances. If I did, it would be like five minutes, 10 minutes.
“I played against Man City in the cup, but I wasn’t even supposed to start. I think Bobby Firmino got injured or was ill. I scored, but got taken off at half-time, and that was it.”
That defeat at the City Ground really did prove to be effectively the endgame for Carvalho in the Premier League last season, with only three substitute appearances (lasting 11 minutes combined) coming his way for the rest of the top-flight campaign.
It was a seismic dropoff for a youngster who’d started four of the preceding five matches in the division and, after his 98th-minute winner against Newcastle, looked like he’d be a hugely valuable impact player for Liverpool.
The 21-year-old declared in the same interview that his teammates had been asking him why Jurgen Klopp wasn’t selecting him more regularly, having been told to ‘be patient’ by his manager.
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Between his sporadic usage at Anfield and his abortive loan to RB Leipzig, 2023 was largely a write-off for Carvalho, but a temporary move to Hull in January has turned out to be the refrsh that his career sorely needed.
Nine goals in 20 matches at the MKM Stadium has given him a genuine chance of making the grade for Liverpool after all, with incoming head coach Arne Slot likely to give him an opportunity to impress in pre-season and hopefully build from there.
Maybe a changing of the managerial guard over the summer could be just what the attacker needs in order to truly lay down roots on Merseyside.