Paul Merson says Slot may now have a ‘huge problem’ to deal with at Liverpool | OneFootball

Arne Slot may have a serious selection dilemma on his hands ahead of Liverpool’s trip to Turf Moor on Sunday.

The Merseysiders will be due to take on Scott Parker’s promoted Burnley side, and Paul Merson believes the Dutch head coach could do with dropping Florian Wirtz from his midfield.

Liverpool have made a perfect start to their Premier League title defence in the 2025/26 season, with three out of three wins secured.

Is it time to drop Florian Wirtz?

(Photo by Stuart Franklin/Getty Images)

It seems a bit of a nutty suggestion to bench our record midfield signing.

To be fair, Wirtz hasn’t had a perfect start to life at Anfield, but there was always going to be an acclimatisation period of sorts, even coming from a stylistically similar league like the Bundesliga.

However, Paul Merson appears to have u-turned on his own suggestion and called for Slot to play a midfield three of Ryan Gravenberch, Alexis Mac Allister and Dominik Szoboszlai.

“He spent big on Florian Wirtz and Alexander Isak, so those two must definitely start?” the Sky Sports pundit wrote in his Sportskeeda column.

“But who do they take out of this team? Where do you play Dominik Szoboszlai? He’s been terrific but you surely can’t keep playing him at right-back? The midfield trio of Ryan Gravenberch, Alexis Mac Allister and Szoboszlai played a huge role in Liverpool’s success last season. So I think Slot has a big headache in terms of team selection now.

“Wirtz is a top player. But there isn’t any need to change something which isn’t broken! The Liverpool midfield looks a bit weak now and if they get overrun in that part of the pitch, it’s a huge problem.

“If I had to pick Liverpool’s best front-three right now, I would go with Mohamed Salah, Alexander Isak and Cody Gakpo. If I had to do the same with their midfield, I would put Szoboszlai in there instead of Wirtz.”

What team should Liverpool put out against Burnley?

In our view, Florian Wirtz should still make the first-XI come Sunday’s Premier League away trip.

We’re still of the mind that it may be ideal to prolong the Dominik Szoboszlai experiment at right-back, given Conor Bradley has only recently returned to the pitch.

Likewise, Jeremie Frimpong looks like he could also be called upon for some minutes this weekend. So, we’re happy not fixing something that isn’t broken at this present stage!

Paul Merson is wrong: Liverpool shouldn’t drop Wirtz

The notion of forcing Wirtz out wide is, with the greatest of respect to Merson, laughable.

There’s not a chance in hell the German international would have agreed to make the switch to Liverpool had we offered him Luis Diaz’s place in the side.

The key offering that clinched the deal ahead of Bayern Munich was the fact that the former Bayer Leverkusen man would be the central cog in the Liverpool machine.

And why shouldn’t he be? When it comes to creative involvement, there are few in world football who exceed Florian Wirtz.

* Florian Wirtz stats over the last 365 days, courtesy of FBref

Put simply, the 22-year-old makes things happen when he’s on the pitch. Once he starts really hitting his stride in England, it’ll be difficult to conceive of a time when he wasn’t one of the first names on the teamsheet.

We’ll find a way to keep the balance right, and in the meantime, it’s perfectly healthy to have some selection dilemmas going into each gameweek!

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