You’ve probably seen the clip by now. Liverpool striker Darwin Nunez has been filmed training with Uruguay ahead of their friendly with Iran on Friday. In a nine-second video circulated on social media, Nunez clumsily bundles a teammate to the floor before sending what appears to be a shot out for a throw-in.
Ever the rational palace of reasoned discussion, the internet has decided this means the forward is a colossal waste of money, worse than Andy Carroll and will fail completely at Anfield. The clip is undeniably funny. There is something of the Sunday League about Nunez clumsily smashing his 6’2 frame into someone before ballooning his shot so badly that it would have left any passing dog-walkers with a sizable vets bill. But it is also nine seconds of a training session, bereft of context, being used to conclusively decide the fortunes of a 23-year-old with six Liverpool appearances under his belt.
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Footballer’s used to be able to make their mistakes out of the public eye. Training was for exactly that, to hone and improve skills and routines needed to win games. Better to make mistakes in practice than on a Saturday. The lack of social media in the pre-internet sadly denied us video proof of the time Paul Gascoigne allegedly brought an ostrich to training at Tottenham Hotspur. But similarly, it also shielded us of the mistakes of some of the game’s all-time heroes.
No player is entirely error-free and, were they playing today, there would likely be a treasure trove of bloopers. You cannot say with any certainty Pele never clipped a corner flag with a shot in Brazil training. That Diego Maradona didn’t miss the odd open goal. That Eusebio didn’t send a pass so helplessly out of play that it was returned by the groundsman. Footballers are human and even the most skilled of them are capable of absurd misjudgements.
Nunez doing his best impression of Dave from the Dog & Duck is the perfect example. The clip robs us of what happened before or after. Tik Tok is not yet omnipresent enough to read thoughts, so we don’t even know for sure whether his hopeless shot was in fact a slightly-less rubbish misplaced cross. Yet people are determined to make definitive statements from nine seconds of a player in a practice situation.
Nunez has not been the sole target of this phenomenon. A clip of England training circulated earlier this year appearing to show Jordan Henderson chiding Harry Maguire for botching a rondo session. Teammate Tyrone Mings had to come out and clarify that the Manchester United defender had not actually ruined the exercise at all and that the clip had been circulated without context.
Everyone is an amateur videographer these days and these sorts of incidents are commonplace. Not all gain the traction of the Nunez incident, which is elevated by both its comedy value and misgivings about a player who has not yet had a chance to truly prove himself. But if you browse football-centric social media from around 2pm onwards on a Saturday, you will see players at all levels make mistakes in warm-ups. These clips will be used to provide or strengthen a narrative on the relative strengths and weaknesses of the player. To the audience these are a fascinating look at the deeper qualities of a player. To the footballer themselves, they’re just trying to loosen up and get their eye in before kick-off.
The Nunez storm will pass. Almost immediately, if he nets against Iran on Friday. But he won’t be the last player whose fortunes are written off over the course of a few seconds of video. Social media at its core is an echo chamber. We all feed it by throwing our opinions at it and, such is the volume of these opinions, only the truly extreme ones gain any traction. Nuance is lost. You won’t get more than two likes saying “Nunez looked a bit Sunday League, there.” But you’ll get a viral hit if you say “This video proves he’s the worst Liverpool player ever.”
We do not know what sort of career Nunez will have at Liverpool. It is far too early to tell. But when it comes time to lodge a verdict, it should be done based on his performances in competitive games. At the end of the day, no player should be judged on ten seconds of what is ostensibly supposed to be behind-closed-doors action.
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