Sky Sports pundit Gary Neville has singled out Milos Kerkez for criticism following his performance during Liverpool’s 2-1 defeat to Chelsea at the weekend.

The Hungarian international has not found life easy since arriving from Bournemouth for £40m in the summer, and Neville says Kerkez looks way out of his depth:

“The boy Kerkez, to be honest with you, at this point in time, he looks like a youth player. I know he’s a good player, but he looks like he’s playing for the youth team, or the Under-21s.”

“He looks so naive, he looks like a baby out there. He’s losing 50-50s with Neto! He’s had Premier League experience, it’s not like he’s come in from another country. He’s got a lot of games under his belt, he’s played at these grounds before, so I expected him to slot in.”

“One, he’s playing alongside Virgil van Dijk, the best centre half in the world, so if you want to play in a back four, you want to play with great defenders and he is doing that. And he’s got player who work hard on that side, it’s not like he’s playing on the right with Salah in front of him, which is always a bit more difficult because you always get a little bit more exposed. But I have to say from the first ten minutes of that game against Bournemouth on the first game of the season, he’s struggled.”

Kerkez has yet to find his feet at Liverpool

While Neville’s comments are harsh, you can’t really find fault in what he is saying. Kerkez has not been able to replicate the form he showed at Bournemouth so far.

At 21 years of age, patience will be needed, but he is playing at an elite club with designs of winning multiple trophies, so if he can’t raise his level soon, head coach Arne Slot woll be forced into dropping him.

Why didn’t Robertson start at Stamford Bridge?

Considering the importance of the fixture, nobody would have batted an eyelid if Slot had decided to bench Kerkez in favour of Andy Robertson.

While there are some fans who think he is over the hill, the Scotland captain possesses a huge amount of experience, and there is no doubt that he would have dealt with the occasion far better than Kerkez. It will be interesting to see who starts at left-back in the first game after the international break against Manchester United.

Read more about the Liverpool First Team Squad for 2025/26 here