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6 months ago
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Darwin Nunez has admitted that he was affected by 'negative comments' following his social media purge of Liverpool-related photos.
The Uruguayan completed his second season at Anfield following a club record £85million signing from Benfica. The striker looked to have turned a corner, having endured a fairly underwhelming debut season.
But Nunez's best form in a Liverpool shirt made way for arguably his worst, resulting in his demotion from the starting XI at the end of the campaign.
His frustration reached boiling point when, after the Reds' 4-2 win over Tottenham on May 5, he deleted all of his Liverpool-related photos from his Instagram account. This led to speculation of an exit this summer.
However, the 24-year-old has revealed that the barrage of criticism took its toll but he insisted he has now resolved to ignore any comment about him - good, bad or indifferent.
Darwin Niunez had a wildly inconsistent season for Liverpool, eventually losing his place in the starting XI
The 24-year-old deleted all Liverpool-related photos from his Instagram account following the Reds' 4-2 win over Tottenham in May
Incoming boss Arne Slot is excited to work with Nunez and sees him as important to his success at Anfield
'From the moment you start playing and until you retire, there will always be someone who will criticise you, he told Por la jersey, via ESPN Uruguay. Before, I did look at them a lot and it affected me.
'Whoever says that those negative comments do not affect them is lying, those negative comments that are directed towards you will always affect you.
'They tell me everything, but I ignore those comments because they are of no use to me. I never look at the negative comments on social media, at least now I'm not looking at anything, not even the good stuff. If a game goes badly for me, I rely on my family .
'When things go badly for me, I get hot, but I try to laugh with my family and not show my son the anger I have, what happened in the game is already there, it's already happened, and there is always revenge.'
Nunez has since changed his Instagram display picture to an image of himself, his partner and child all wearing Liverpool kits after Sunday’s 2-0 win over Wolves.
Reds fan fears of losing the perplexing forward were also quashed by reports that incoming manager Arne Slot is an admirer.
Slot sees Nunez as critical to what he wants to achieve at Anfield, name-checking him to sporting director Richard Hughes as one of the key players he is looking forward to working with.
It scotches the suggestion Nunez will fall behind Cody Gakpo in the attacking pecking order simply because the new manager is also Dutch.
After all, if Slot plays the same 4-2-3-1 formation he did at Feyenoord, he will need a bustling, bulldozing centre forward and Nunez should fit the bill.
With 31 goal contributions in 54 appearances, the 2023-24 season certainly has not been a failure, yet Nunez continues to be jeered from opposition fans, frequently singing 'You're just a s*** Andy Carroll.'
Nunez has since updated his Instagram profile picture to show his family in Liverpool shirts
The Uruguayan scored 18 goals in all competitions, including a 99th-minute winner against Nottingham Forest in March
The former Benfica man had the pleasure of silencing one of those sets of home fans when he netted a 99th minute winner against Nottingham Forest in March.
Though, he didn't even realise they were aiming abuse at him.
'In that game, the Nottingham fans were singing to me.' He added. 'But I didn't understand anything, thank goodness. I ended up scoring the goal on the hour, and then [Jurgen Klopp] in the locker room said "screw them."'
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