Liverpool winger Cody Gakpo becomes the lightning rod for criticism following Liverpool’s 2-1 defeat to Wolves in the Premier League.
If Saturday’s 5-2 thrashing of West Ham was supposed to be the launchpad for a final Champions League push, Tuesday night at Molineux felt like the parachute failing to open. In a season defined by its maddening inconsistency, The Reds once again found a way to lose a game they should have put to bed, and the post-mortem has been predictably clinical.
While Alisson Becker’s late lapse will grab the headlines, the finger of blame is increasingly being pointed at the other end of the pitch. Specifically, at Cody Gakpo. The Dutch international, who has struggled to ignite for much of this campaign, found himself at the centre of a stinging assessment from Jamie O’Hara on Wednesday morning.
“He ain’t good enough”
Speaking on Sky Sports News, O’Hara didn’t mince his words when comparing the current crop to the attacking standard-bearers of Liverpool’s recent past. For the former Tottenham midfielder, the drop-off from the departed Luis Diaz to Gakpo is the primary reason the Reds find themselves stalled in fifth place.
“Luis Diaz was one of their best players,” O’Hara claimed. “He left and you’ve got Cody Gakpo playing. He ain’t good enough. He’s an average player in the Premier League. He’s not good enough.”
It is a harsh appraisal of a player who cost £37m, but it is one that is beginning to chime with a frustrated section of the Anfield faithful. Gakpo’s return of just eight goals in 37 matches is a far cry from the 18 he notched during a far more productive 2024/25 campaign.
At Molineux, his evening was summed up in one agonising second-half moment where he inadvertently blocked a goal-bound Curtis Jones effort that would have surely changed the trajectory of the match and put the visitors 1-0 ahead.
The predictability problem
The criticism of the 26-year-old isn’t just about the numbers; it’s about the style. Under Arne Slot, the “off-the-cuff effervescence” that Diaz provided has been replaced by a more structured, yet often ponderous, approach. Gakpo has become the poster boy for this “boring” tag, frequently cutting inside onto his right foot in a manner that Premier League full-backs have seemingly decoded.
O’Hara extended his critique beyond Gakpo, labeling the entire Liverpool side as “poor” and “boring” following the defeat to the Premier League’s basement club, questioning whether the pragmatic style of play under Slot is actually taking the club backwards
A matter of confidence
Despite the noise from the pundits, Gakpo does not lack support within the AXA Training Centre walls. Senior figures like Andy Robertson have been vocal in their backing, with the Scot taking to Instagram to celebrate Gakpo’s recent goal.
However, professional solidarity only goes so far in a results-based business. With Slot still easing the highly-rated Rio Ngumoha into first-team life with extreme caution, Gakpo remains an essential cog in the Liverpool machine by default.
Whether he can rediscover the “superb” form he showed last season remains the multi-million pound question. For the sake of his own Liverpool career and the club’s rapidly fading top-four hopes he needs to find an answer before the summer window opens..
