
Liverpool have made a great start to the season with new manager Arne Slot finding unlikely heroes in the Reds squad in the ongoing campaign.
The Reds are at the summit of the Premier League table after six wins from their opening seven league games and have emerged as a contender to win the title.
Liverpool are braced for tougher tests after the international break when they will take on Chelsea and Arsenal in back-to-back Premier League games.
However, Slot has stamped his mark on the team early and has got the best out of players who were not expected to be the main men ahead of the start of the season.
Ryan Gravenberch’s renaissance this season has shocked many with the Dutchman emerging as the lynchpin of the Liverpool midfield.
Liverpool’s failure to bring in Martin Zubimendi from Real Sociedad in the summer forced Slot to repurpose his compatriot and the 22-year-old has not disappointed his manager.
I expected Arne Slot to move on Ryan Gravenberch in the summer – Ex-Liverpool star
Steve Nicol is one of the former Liverpool players who has been taken aback by what he has seen from Gravenberch in the first couple of months of the season.
He conceded that his performances at the base of the Liverpool midfield have surprised him and it has come as a shock given what everyone saw of him last season.
The former Red admitted that he was one of the players he expected Slot to try and sell in the summer but he is pleased to see Gravenberch turn his career around at Anfield.
“Talk about coming from absolutely nowhere… My goodness, what he’s produced – talk about putting somebody in the perfect position”, Nicol said on ESPN FC.
“He’s been sensational. The amount of times that he breaks up the play because of his starting position and his decision-making, when to step in and win the ball and when to sit back and wait, has really surprised me.
“It’s shocked me, to be honest.
“I was looking at Gravenberch as someone Slot would look to move on but in a very short space of time he has completely changed my opinion and, I’m sure, plenty of other opinions as well.”
