Why I have cooled on Darwin Núñez

I love a chaos merchant; I just don't think that fits at Arsenal

I think if you described me as a Darwin Nunez apologist or truther that would be an accurate description.

There was a brief window last summer where the possibility of Nunez to Arsenal was open and I was one of the bigger backers of the idea. I have defended him from the complaints about his finishing and thought that Liverpool had made a really smart buy when they plucked him out Portugal.

It looks like by all accounts; Nunez is being told that he is no longer in the plans at Liverpool and that he is free to find himself a new place to play.

So given my previous excitement about the player, this should make me giddy given Arsenal have a need in attack, and I can dream about the player again.

Except I find myself significantly less on board with the idea of this move. The biggest reason is what we just saw with Nunez under Arne Slot.

Under Jurgen Klopp Nunez was a devil and his combination of relentlessness and athleticism was a potent combination and it was perfect for the type of play that Liverpool employed in that era.

He missed a ton of chances those years and it started to question if maybe it was something about his style that just made him a below xG player but even discounting that he might never be the goals = xG guy he put up good scoring numbers and there was the if he just put it together this is one of the best players in the game type production.

So, this is what made me excited, and I thought Liverpool fans that were down on him were giving up on a player too easy for what he did.

Then I saw him play this year…

Slot is a different type of coach than Klopp. He was able to work with the players that played the heavy metal soccer previously, but it was still in a much more controlled style. I suspect that this is something that was directly tied to the downturn in Nunez’s production this season.

The system just did not have the same accommodations for Nunez to create chaos that they had previously and Nunez that has his dialed turned back from 11 is just not as much fun and not nearly as good.

I don’t think Mikel Arteta is so rigged that he won’t allow for chaos in his team, I do worry that he would be like Slot and not like the stuff that Nunez does and try to hold it back and while that doesn’t mean he is a bad player, what makes him special is harder to bet on showing up.

I am a guy that loves upside, and I am willing to put up with a player that is under their xG for a lot longer than most but introducing something that puts that ceiling inside of the team into question puts a real damper on the way I view a potential move.

I think that there are some great potential landing spots for Nunez and he very well could go and max out his potential making Liverpool look dumb to give up on him. I just have more doubt that Arsenal are that perfect landing spot and that there is a higher chance that this is a deal that falls on its face. That makes me a bit sad because at his best I think Nunez could provide the type of impact that other chaos players like Alexis Sanchez and Luis Suarez were able to provide in the Premier League.

I will watch to see how this goes with curiosity and hope that he can go to a team that gives him back that freedom.