Darwin Nunez appeared to delete a tweet that was critical of Arne Slot on the eve of Liverpool’s potential title-winning moment. Nunez has struggled for game time under Slot this season and the Liverpool manager was forced to respond to suggestions he has been benched for financial reasons.
The Uruguay international has started just 17 times this season and has not featured for the Reds since the 3-2 defeat by Fulham at the start of the month. Nunez was not in the squad for the win over West Ham and remained on the bench last week at Leicester, prompting rumours from Portugal.
Slot was reported to be avoiding playing Nunez in order to avoid triggering a transfer instalment of £4.2million to Benfica. The Liverpool manager rubbished the rumour in his press conference on Friday ahead of Sunday’s match against Tottenham, where they can secure the Premier League title with a draw.
However, Nunez has poured more fuel on the rumours by writing and then quickly deleting a post on X. In a post to his 827,000 followers, which was screenshotted by fans, he wrote: “No wonder I didn’t play more, because the last game I started in the Premier League went well and suddenly…”
The 25-year-old, who scored on his last start in the 3-1 win over Southampton last month, took the post down and replaced it an hour later with a photo of himself and Alexis Mac Allister enjoying mate – a popular South American caffeinated drink. He captioned it “Good morning”, but the replies made clear his first post hadn’t been forgotten.
“Bro is acting like nothing happened,” one fan wrote. “We saw it brudda,” another added. “We ain’t dumb bro,” a third wrote.
Nunez has seven goals and seven assists in 42 games across all competitions, but hasn’t convinced Slot of his ability. He has been linked with a summer transfer and Slot might not appreciate having to answer questions about him ahead of their potential crowning as champions.
“Do you always believe what journalists say? Not always? Me neither,” he said on Friday when asked about the Nunez rumours. “Sometimes you should, but sometimes it’s better not to believe everything that is written about players. This is completely new to me and I’ve said many times that I’m working at a club here where it’s really nice to work.
“So mainly sporting directors are judged by the players they bring in, for me it’s very important to have a great working environment and I have that with Richard [Hughes]. The last, last, last, last, last thing he would do, as I expect working with him for 10 months, is tell me: ‘If you play him it would cost us this much’.
“That, he would never, never, never do. I don’t even know if it’s true, yes or no, because we never talk about that. He never interferes with a lineup. It might be true, but if a journalist says it we have to….. (take it with a pinch of salt?).”
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