Liverpool's former cult hero branded 'worst signing of the season' could leave in January

Liverpool's former cult hero has been branded as the 'worst signing of the season' by the media after a poor opening to the new season.

Divock Origi's move to AC Milan has not gone to plan and the club is reportedly looking to offload the forward at the earliest convenience.

Having spent eight years on Merseyside, the Belgian forward has failed to impress at the home of the Serie A champions and the club has seemingly already had enough.

Replacements have been identified and he may already be on borrowed time and could exit in the January window.

Flop of the season?

Origi was recently branded as the “worst signing of the season” in Serie A following a less than inspiring start - despite only playing 81 minutes of action.

It seems the Italian club are being a little premature in their thinking, considering that he hasn't even started a game yet in any competition.

Clearly, they don't know how to utilise him best - every Liverpool fan knows Origi only comes alive sporadically and you have to take the rough with the smooth to get moments such as the Champions League final goal, or the performance against Barcelona.

Come on Milan, don't you know your Origi history?

Nevertheless, according to Calciomercato, the Serie A champions are targeting Lille’s Jonathan David and Red Bull Salzburg’s Noah Okafor as potential replacements for Origi in the January transfer window.

Okafor was seen scoring against Chelsea in the Champions League last night and David already has four goals and two assists in seven Ligue 1 matches for Lille.

The comments have been very media driven - given that Milan's manager Stefano Poli claimed "I'm not worried about Origi's injury, but sorry. He is a player we strongly wanted and I'm now hoping to have him back after the [international] break."

Looking at his performance stats, he has an average rating of 6.25 in Serie A and 5.97 in the Champions League, with extremely limited minutes that can be demonstrated by the fact that he only averages 2.3 passes per game in the league - my advice to Milan is give him a chance (at least!).

However, since joining Milan on a free transfer in July after his Liverpool contract expired, injuries have hampered his start. Considering he signed a four-year deal, Milan may want to revisit that in the future, if he continues to underperform and pick up injuries.

It corresponds to the right decision to allow him leave this summer on a free transfer as he would be fourth choice as a forward at Liverpool. From what seems highly unfair, perhaps we'll revisit this topic in January to see how he's fared - but it's clear that the feeling in Italy is that he needs to buck his ideas up and do so soon.