The Darwin Nunez dilemma: Liverpool have a colossal call to make on the Uruguayan enigma

After walking straight down the tunnel in a huff after a characteristically chaotic cameo during Sunday's 4-2 win over Tottenham, Nunez deleted every single image of himself in a Liverpool shirt from his Instagram account - bar his profile picture.

We don't yet know why, though it has been claimed that Nunez - and even his partner - suffered online abuse after his latest error-strewn display. If true, Nunez has every reason to be upset with the supposed Liverpool supporters in question, who have been called out by Jurgen Klopp in the past.

It would also be understandable if the "resilience" he has so often relied on to get him through tough times is now wavering. Indeed, it's worth remembering that Nunez has been targeted by trolls for nearly two years, dismissed as an expensive transfer flop before he'd even played a competitive fixture for Liverpool. It's "a crazy world out there," as Klopp said all the way back in the summer of 2022.

However, while Nunez deserves sympathy, he is not exempt from scrutiny - and certainly not from the vast majority of fans who have stood by him since his arrival at Anfield. In fact, at a time when the future of several key Liverpool players is being discussed, it is only right that Nunez's role in a new era at Anfield comes under the spotlight - because the unpredictable Uruguayan remains a riddle, a lightning-quick contradiction who continues to excite and frustrate in equal measure.

Even during his difficult debut season, the potential was obvious to Reds. Their £64 million ($80m) signing from Benfica was erratic but electrifying. When he was on the field, it felt like anything could - and probably would - happen.

It looked like they would be rewarded for their patience, too. Nunez started the current season on the bench, but slowly and surely began to come good. There were still some inexplicable misses and dreadful decisions, but it was clear that he had got to grips with what Klopp was asking of him from a defensive perspective, while his end product also improved enormously. As well as 31 goal involvements in all competitions, there were also decisive displays against the likes of Newcastle, Bournemouth and Nottingham Forest.

However, the fans' faith in the forward is now being tested once again, after a frankly calamitous conclusion to the campaign.

Nunez hasn't scored in eight consecutive appearances in all competitions, but is hardly solely to blame for Liverpool's late-season collapse. Several players have struggled terribly during the run-in, primarily due to the effects of physical and mental fatigue caused by a horrific, mid-season injury crisis.

The strikers didn't just stop scoring, after all; the defenders couldn't keep clean sheets either. Indeed, Liverpool haven't recorded a shutout in the Premier League since the 1-0 victory at Nottingham Forest on March 2. Nunez scored the winner that day, coming off the bench to spark wild scenes of celebration in the away end at the City Ground with a well-taken header in the dying seconds of the game.

However, he has scored just one goal since, and even that arrived in highly fortuitous circumstances at the start of April, with Nunez deflecting an attempted clearance by Sheffield United goalkeeper Ivo Grbic into the back of the net.

What's followed has been tough to watch (at least for his loyal followers). Nunez squandered gilt-edged opportunities against Manchester United, Crystal Palace and Everton - the games that derailed Liverpool's title challenge - as well as the fatal first-leg loss to Atalanta in the Europa League quarter-finals.

Furthermore, what really grated was not the fact that he missed the chances, but how he did so. So many shots have been blindly blasted at goal, as if absolutely zero thought was given to the attempted finish, while on other occasions, Nunez seemed to completely overlook the more obvious and far easier option to score. Sometimes, he just did both.

For example, against Spurs on Sunday, he was put through on goal by a sublime through-ball from Mohamed Salah inside the Liverpool half. With Guglielmo Vicario haring out of his area, the most logical decision was to use the pace on the pass to take the ball around the over-committed Italian. Nunez instead opted to shoot straight at the goalkeeper, which helps explain why he has such an atrocious conversion rate (11.11 percent) this season.

Of course, he could have easily come off the field with another assist to his name (he has eight in the Premier League alone this season - as many as Phil Foden) but he was almost inevitably offside when he crossed for Salah to slot home late on, and Nunez's inability to time his runs in behind the backline is becoming a serious source of frustration.

Forwards like Nunez understandably like to play on the shoulder of the last defender, but at this stage, there really is no excuse for a player blessed with such a tremendous turn of pace being caught offside more times than any other player in the Premier League this season (32 in total - twice as many as Ollie Watkins). He doesn't seem to have learned how to look across the line - or, perhaps more importantly, that he doesn't need to bolt quite so early.

When one also considers that only Haaland (32) has missed more 'big chances' in 2023-24 than Nunez (27), it's easy to understand why doubts over his long-term future at Anfield are now creeping in. For all his attributes and improvements, he has still to show that he can become a reliable, elite-level goal-scorer. And yet it would be a major surprise if he were to leave Liverpool this summer.

For starters, it seems highly unlikely that any club in Europe would offer Liverpool anything close to the fee they paid for Nunez. Secondly, he still seems the most likely candidate to spearhead the attack next season under incoming manager Arne Slot, who may well feel he can do as good a job with Nunez as he has done with Feyenoord's Santiago Gimenez, the Mexico forward with similar traits.

Diogo Jota is obviously considered by many as the best finisher on Liverpool's books, but as this season has so painfully hammered home, the Portuguese simply cannot be relied upon to stay fit, while it's also now clear that Cody Gakpo's best position is on the left flank, meaning the Reds could well decide to allow Luis Diaz to move to Spain in order to raise funds to strengthen elsewhere. As for Salah, the noises coming out of Anfield right now suggest that the Egyptian will not only stay, but maybe even extend his contract with the club.

But even that news arguably reflects badly on Nunez, who has just not done enough to suggest that he is capable of taking over the mantle as Liverpool's leading man anytime soon.

Obviously, any criticism that steps over the line needs to be called out, and stamped out. But the best way to cope with the "clowns" on social media is to focus solely on repaying the true fans' faith in him. After all, he has retained the support of so many Liverpool supporters because his game has undeniably developed this season, so the last thing he should do is turn his back on those that have had his for the past two years.

After all, Nunez's finishing remains a legitimate cause for concern and he needs to take the constructive criticism on the chin. Because he is still making far too many bizarre decisions right now - and deleting nearly all of his Liverpool photos was another one.