Winners and losers from international break as Alexander Isak and Florian Wirtz rated
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Liverpool fans will no doubt greet the end of the international break as the Reds prepare to return to action in the Premier League.
Arne Slot will be welcoming his players back over the next couple of days as he plans for Sunday’s game against Burnley, with Liverpool looking to make it four wins out of four and strengthen its case for being the favorite for this season’s title.
The good news for Slot is that his international stars look to have come away from their duties unscathed, although some of his players did endure contrasting fortunes over the past few days.
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Here’s a look at Liverpool’s winners and losers during the international break, with some players perhaps happier to get back to domestic matters this week.
Winners
Having finally secured his move to Anfield just hours before jetting off to meet up with his Sweden teammates, the international break may have actually come at the perfect time for Alexander Isak.
It feels strange to be labeling someone who only played around 20 minutes in a 2-0 defeat to Kosovo a winner, but Slot will no doubt be more than happy to not see his new record signing rushed back into action, while also getting back into the rhythm of training alongside others and getting his first minutes of the season before reporting for duty with the Reds.
Rio Ngumoha’s stock continues to rise after he made his debut for England U19s, and having been included in the squad for the Champions League, no doubt we’ll be seeing him get more first-team opportunities at Liverpool over the coming weeks.
It’s been a frustrating start to the season for Conor Bradley, with injury toward the end of preseason wrecking his chance of making the right-back slot his own following Trent Alexander-Arnold’s departure
The 31-year-old looks as though he might have to concede the first-choice left-back spot to Milos Kerkez now, although he gave a timely reminder of his quality as he helped Scotland to four points on the road against Denmark and Belarus.
Losers
It’s been a tricky start to life at Liverpool for Florian Wirtz, and many might have expected him to start showing his quality while away with Germany.
We certainly saw some of that with his free-kick against Northern Ireland, but overall it proved to be a difficult couple of games for the former Bayer Leverkusen man, with the German media pulling no punches on his performances.
Florian Wirtz had a mixed international break
Admittedly, the midfielder hasn’t been at full fitness at the start of this season, and with the defending world champions having already secured their place at next year’s tournament, you have to question why Lionel Scaloni chose to leave him on for the full 90 minutes.
It was a frustrating evening for Mohamed Salah as well as Egypt drew a blank against Burkina Faso, with the goalless draw meaning the Pharaohs will have to wait until the next international break to secure their place at the World Cup.
Salah will be hoping he can hit some of his best form before that break next month, with last season’s player of the year recently admitting he hasn’t yet struck up an understanding with Hugo Ekitike, and the arrival of Isak may well complicate things a little more.