Andoni Iraola’s Liverpool: Promise and Problems Ahead
The first glimpse of Andoni Iraola’s Liverpool came with a soundtrack of country music in Nashville, street noise in New York and the wind whipping in off Lake Michigan in Chicago. Two wins, one defeat, a flurry of goals and an even bigger flurry of questions.
By the time Leeds had finished tearing into a much-changed Liverpool side in a 4-2 win at Soldier Field, the romance of a new era had met the reality of a squad still under construction.
A bold idea that needs time
For 45 minutes against Leeds, Iraola’s blueprint crackled. Liverpool pressed high, snapped into tackles, hunted the ball in packs and attacked with a tempo that felt more feral than the controlled chaos of recent years. With senior names back on the pitch, his front-foot, high-intensity approach looked exactly what the club thought they were buying.
Then the changes came. So did the old problems.
Set-piece frailty resurfaced. Concentration dipped. The same lapses that dogged last season reappeared, this time under a new coach who has barely had a full deck to work with. It was worrying, but also instructive. Iraola got a live demonstration of what still needs ripping out of this team.
The context matters. He has not yet taken a training session with Virgil van Dijk, Cody Gakpo, Alisson, Alexis Mac Allister or new signing Víctor Muñoz. Nearly two months into the job, he has only seen some of his most important players on a screen. They are due back at the AXA Training Centre on Wednesday, still shaking off the flight from Chicago. Mac Allister will be away a little longer after his World Cup exertions.
The calendar offers little sympathy. Fewer than three weeks remain before Liverpool walk out at Newcastle to open their Premier League season. Only two friendlies are left, a double-header against Como at Anfield, to knit ideas, legs and personalities together.
Iraola admitted he cannot simply click his fingers and produce a finished product on day one. On this evidence, he is right. The idea is clear. The execution will take time.
A coach who needs help from above
If the tour underlined anything, it was this: Iraola cannot fix Liverpool’s issues on coaching alone.
For long stretches in the United States he worked without eight first-team players, all on post-World Cup breaks, and six more through injury. Joe Gomez’s misfortune in the US only stretched resources further. Strip 14 senior options out of any squad and pre-season becomes an exercise in improvisation rather than preparation.
Even when everyone is available, the gaps are obvious.
Mohamed Salah’s departure was announced in March. Talks to end his contract a year early started before that. Five months on, there is still no replacement. That is not a tactical problem; it is a structural one.
Conor Bradley’s serious knee injury has left Liverpool light at right-back. In central defence, the club’s brightest prospects come with caveats. Jérémy Jacquet and Giovanni Leoni are highly regarded – Leoni has rebuilt himself into a powerful presence during his recovery from an anterior cruciate ligament injury – but they are untested in the Premier League. Ifeanyi Ndukwe and Mor Talla Ndiaye impressed in the US at just 18, yet Ndukwe cannot feature this season because of post-Brexit work permit rules.
Gomez’s injury history means he has to be seen as a bonus when fit, not a cornerstone of a four-man centre-back group. That is a brutal calculation, but a necessary one.
Iraola spoke intriguingly about his preference for wingers who can operate on both flanks and the tactical edge that comes from switching them mid-game. It is an appealing vision. Still, Liverpool’s right side looks vulnerable even if they manage to prise Bradley Barcola from Paris Saint-Germain. The new head coach has given the recruitment team a clear template. Now he needs them to move.
Nyoni steps out of the shadows
The upside of a depleted squad was obvious: opportunity. Young players did not just fill out the numbers; they had to carry responsibility. Many rose to it.
Ndukwe, Talla Ndiaye, Lewis Koumas, Kieran Morrison and Luke Chambers all showed they belong at this level of preparation, at the very least. But one teenager forced his way into the conversation more than any other.
Nyoni arrived on this tour as a promising midfielder on the fringes. He left it firmly in Iraola’s plans.
The 19-year-old, like Rio Ngumoha, had already been part of Arne Slot’s group last season. Ngumoha made 19 Premier League appearances, five from the start. Nyoni’s league involvement was limited to six cameos off the bench.
In the US, he played as if determined to change that pecking order. He took Iraola’s instructions to heart: find forward options early, play through pressure, move intelligently to open passing lanes. Whether pressed or given space, he kept the ball moving with purpose.
His contribution in the buildup to Florian Wirtz’s goal against Leeds summed up his tour. The pass, threaded with precision, was as elegant as it was incisive. It was not a one-off. It was in tune with everything he had been doing over the three games.
After the Leeds match, Nyoni admitted he knew he had to improve this summer. On this evidence, he has done exactly that.
Jones at a crossroads
While one midfielder surged, another stalled.
Curtis Jones, entering the final year of his Liverpool contract and attracting growing interest from Italian champions Inter, did not seize his chance. Where Nyoni and Dominik Szoboszlai adapted quickly to Iraola’s central-midfield demands, Jones looked uncomfortable.
His difficulties were most stark in the second half against Leeds, when he struggled to impose himself or sync with the pressing patterns and positional discipline Iraola expects. That, in itself, might have been written off as a bad day.
What lingered longer was his reaction in New York.
Against Wrexham, when Szoboszlai passed the captain’s armband on, Jones expected it. Instead, it went to Kostas Tsimikas. Jones’s petulant response did him no favours. The same thing had happened in the opening game against Sunderland when Gomez went off: Tsimikas, a reserve left-back who spent last season on loan at Roma, again took the armband.
For a boyhood Liverpool fan and one of the more senior figures on the tour, the snub clearly stung. Jones, Szoboszlai and Tsimikas all worked hard in the following days to laugh off the incident and cool the noise on social media. Even so, the optics were damaging.
In Chicago, Iraola stressed the importance of the collective, of everyone pulling in the same direction. Against that backdrop, Jones’s reaction jarred. In a summer when roles and hierarchies are being redrawn, he has given his new coach as many questions as answers.
Szoboszlai takes centre stage
If there was one constant presence across the Atlantic, it was Dominik Szoboszlai.
With Salah, Andy Robertson, Van Dijk and Alisson all absent, Liverpool’s reigning player of the season became the face of the tour. In Nashville, New York and Chicago, his name drew the loudest roars. Every touch, every shot, every warm-up wave was greeted like a small event.
The attention did not distract him. It sharpened him.
On the training pitches, Szoboszlai set the standard. His intensity, competitiveness and willingness to lead were invaluable in a group heavy on youth and light on established stars. He looked every inch the reference point Iraola needs in this transitional phase.
Off the pitch, fresh from signing a new five-year contract, he carried himself like a long-term pillar of the project. With Salah and Robertson gone, Liverpool suddenly have vice-captain vacancies. Szoboszlai, 25 and already the heartbeat of this side, looks a natural candidate.
Three games in America have not answered every question about Iraola’s Liverpool. They were never going to. What they have done is strip away any illusion that this is a simple handover. The ideas are bold, the talent is there, but the holes are obvious and the clock is ticking.
The next move belongs to the club. Will they give their new head coach the tools his vision demands before Newcastle comes into view?
