{"id":450159,"date":"2026-02-28T11:07:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-28T11:07:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/450159\/"},"modified":"2026-02-28T11:07:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-28T11:07:12","slug":"florian-wirtz-injury-has-opened-door-for-kieran-morrison-to-repeat-rio-ngumoha-success","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/450159\/","title":{"rendered":"Florian Wirtz injury has opened door for Kieran Morrison to repeat Rio Ngumoha success"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"\/ Add as preferred source on Google <\/a> <\/p>\n

With Florian Wirtz potentially facing a spell on the sidelines, it\u2019s time for Kieran Morrison to follow in the footsteps of Rio Ngumoha.<\/p>\n

After he missed the Nottingham Forest tie, the Liverpool<\/a> manager seemed to suggest that Wirtz would have recovered<\/a> in time to face West Ham United on Saturday.<\/p>\n

However, Slot ruled out the German<\/a> during his pre-match press conference on Friday and confirmed he did not know when he\u2019d be back<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Wirtz was a big miss against Forest<\/a>, and now it looks as though it is not a short-term injury; the Dutchman needs to find more solutions to help out his forward line.<\/p>\n

Who should be Liverpool\u2019s no.10 vs West Ham? Mac Allister over Szoboszlai? \ud83e\udd14 <\/p>\n

\"AlexisCredit: Julian Finney\/Getty Images Kieran Morrison can help cover Florian Wirtz\u2019s absence<\/p>\n

Rio Ngumoha shone at the City Ground<\/a> during his brief cameo, with Jamie Carragher saying he did more than Mohamed Salah<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The young winger should now be given more playing time in the Premier League moving forward, but Wirtz\u2019s absence could also open the door for Kieran Morrison<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Morrison has trained with Liverpool\u2019s senior side<\/a> ahead of West Ham and is now likely to be on the bench this weekend.<\/p>\n

The 19-year-old is a natural right winger and could follow in the footsteps of Ngumoha<\/a> and start competing with Salah out wide.<\/p>\n

CHANGE MY MIND: Liverpool will drop points vs West Ham if Wirtz doesn\u2019t play \ud83d\udc40 <\/p>\n

He’s our most important player right now, not Szoboszlai<\/p>\n

\"FlorianPhoto by Christian Kaspar-Bartke\/Getty Images <\/p>\n

But he is also a very capable attacking midfielder, meaning he can be used as an alternative to Wirtz<\/a> while he\u2019s out of action.<\/p>\n

Morrison is ready to leave the Liverpool Academy<\/a> behind him, as has become clear in his performances this season.<\/p>\n

He is well on course to break a Liverpool record set by Harry Wilson<\/a> when he was still featuring in the Reds\u2019 youth ranks, already notching 10 goals and three assists in 14 Premier League 2 games this season.<\/p>\n

And while Slot has been criticised for his use of youngsters this season, the lack of depth in the senior squad means Wirtz\u2019s absence could easily be filled by Morrison.<\/p>\n

Ngumoha has already taken his chance; now it\u2019s time for another Academy gem to make an impact in the Premier League.<\/p>\n

Join Our Newsletter<\/p>\n

Receive a digest of our best Liverpool content each week direct to your mailbox<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Add as preferred source on Google With Florian Wirtz potentially facing a spell on the sidelines, it\u2019s time…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":450160,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[2226,218,143868,27079,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-450159","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-florian-wirtz","tag-football","tag-kieran-morrison","tag-rio-ngumoha","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450159","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=450159"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450159\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/450160"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=450159"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=450159"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=450159"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}