DARWIN NUNEZ is not just a pretty face — and Jurgen Klopp knows it.
The Liverpool boss may have joked that he was “extremely good looking” ahead of their Champions League quarter-final second leg with Benfica in April.
6Benfica star Darwin Nunez is closing in on a move to LiverpoolCredit: Instagram
6Uruguay international Nunez is wanted by a host of clubs across EuropeCredit: Instagram
Nunez scored in both matches for the Portuguese side as they went down 6-4 on aggregate.
The 22-year-old star completed the campaign with 34 goals for Benfica and Klopp was so impressed that he wants to make him the new poster boy of his attack.
Nunez is also in high demand at Manchester United and Newcastle, with a battle for his signature underway.
But Nunez is understood to prefer a move to Merseyside and if he gets his wish there would be something rather fitting in that.
For he grew up in Uruguay next to another, smaller river called the Quarai on a flood zone within the El Pirata settlement of the small town of Artegas, amidst abject poverty.
So poor were his family that his mother Silvia walked the streets to find empty glass bottles to sell to buy him football boots.
Dad Bibiano slaved day and night on building sites as a labourer to ensure there was enough food on the table.
That was when the table might be washed away when the Quarai would burst its banks, regularly destroying the homes of those, like the family Nunez, who lived near it.
At 14, Nunez was discovered playing for local club San Miguel de Artigas and it was then that a river of tears also began to flow.
He wept along with his mum and dad as he boarded the bus to travel the 370 miles to Montevideo alone to join the Penarol academy.
A year later he was back, homesick.
One more year on, back at Penarol and alongside his brother Junior who had also signed for the club family problems dictated that only one of them could stay and keep dreaming of fame and fortune.
Junior went home, sacrificing himself and his future because he believed Darwin was a better player than him with a far bigger chance of making it big.
Junior, who was in Penarol’s third team, told his brother: “I leave because you have more conditions than me.”
Three years after that heart-breaking choice there would finally be tears of joy.
Spanish second division side Almeria paid £4million for Nunez and this time he cried for joy, breaking down as he revealed: “With this pass I will be able to buy my parents’ house in Artigas.
“My parents sacrificed for me, my mother collected bottles in the street and my father worked all day in construction. I owe my family so much.”
Yet even during his time at Penarol there was pain and suffering.
He spent a total of over two years out after first sustaining a cruciate knee ligament injury then damage to his kneecap.
Nunez came back too early following the first problem and picked up the second on his return in a derby clash with River Plate – cue more tears on the stretcher as he was carried off.
He returned to play in 2018 but as he sought to regain form he was targeted on social media.
The youngster found the criticism so unbearable that he needed the help of a psychologist to help him deal with it.
But at Almeria as a front man and playing wide left he quickly built a reputation as a goal scorer in season 2019-20 scoring 16 goals.
By the end of it he was Benfica’s record buy at £20m and he admits there were more happy tears as he wore the jersey of Portugal’s most famous club for the first time.
He finished his first season at the Stadium of Light with yet another knee injury yet he had become hardened by his experiences.
At Penarol after his cruciate injury, he considered quitting, saying: “I went through an ugly injury that took me a year and five months.
“At times I wanted to stop playing, but my family and my teammates were always there and encouraged me to continue.
“I set out to do that and today I am stronger than ever.”
It was the strength of Nunez – more than those good looks – that really impressed Klopp.
In April he said: “Really good, really good. I knew before, of course, but he played pretty much in front of me with his tough battles with Ibrahima Konate.
“He was physically strong, quick, was calm around his finish. Good, really good. I always say in these situations if he is healthy, it’s a big career ahead of him.”
Nunez, clearly, is healthy and has become for Liverpool and the rivals from Old Trafford and the Toon, the must – have player as the transfer market opens.
His battle through adversity alone, proves his hunger to succeed.
He does, indeed, have a big career in front of him having already shown that he is, indeed, not just a pretty face.
