Andoni Iraola's Key Challenges at Liverpool: Fast-Tracking Jacquet and Shaping Ngumoha

Andoni Iraola’s in-tray at Liverpool is already full, and most of his players haven’t even walked back through the doors at the AXA Training Centre yet.

The new head coach will get his first proper look at the full group on July 14, before Liverpool fly to the United States on July 20. For some, it’s a reset. For others, it’s an audition. For Iraola, it’s the moment to start bending this squad into his image after a season that fell short of expectations.

Three issues stand out before a ball is kicked in anger.

1. Fast‑track Jacquet

Jeremy Jacquet turns 21 on Monday. He’s cost £60m, he’s coming off shoulder surgery that cut short his season in February, and he’s walking into one of the most scrutinised defences in Europe. There are gentler introductions to life at Liverpool.

But Liverpool didn’t sign him to ease him in.

With Giovanni Leoni still recovering from the ACL injury he suffered 10 months ago, Jacquet is likely to spend much of the summer as Joe Gomez’s partner at centre-back. Every friendly, every training drill, every one-v-one duel will be watched and replayed. He is the defensive story of pre-season.

The club hierarchy are convinced he can carry the weight. Iraola’s track record backs that belief. At Bournemouth, the Basque coach turned Dean Huijsen from a talented prospect into a Spain international and, ultimately, a £60m signing for Real Madrid. He knows how to strip the fear out of young defenders and give them clarity.

That’s exactly what Jacquet needs now.

Liverpool’s plan is obvious: get him up to speed quickly enough to stand next to Virgil van Dijk in the Premier League. Pre-season becomes his crash course in the line, the press, the distances, the demands. He is the only summer signing on the tour, which only amplifies the spotlight. Every touch in America will be framed as a clue to what comes next.

The games are friendlies on paper. For Jacquet, they are anything but.

2. Decide Curtis Jones’ path

Curtis Jones returns from holiday in Mallorca next week facing a question that has hovered over his career for too long: central to Liverpool’s plans, or expendable asset?

Inter have already tested the water twice. Their second approach, under £22m, was knocked back. Liverpool would reluctantly consider business at around £35m, and the gap in valuation has led some inside Anfield to wonder if talks with the Italians have simply run aground.

That stand-off hands Iraola an opening.

With Alexis Mac Allister still at the World Cup and Ryan Gravenberch on his break, there is a midfield place up for grabs on tour. For a city-centre-born Academy graduate who grew up with Liverpool, the idea of walking away is hardly appealing. But the reality is clear: a lack of minutes has encouraged clubs like Inter and Aston Villa to circle.

Pre-season could change the tone.

If Iraola can sell Jones a convincing role in his system, the 23-year-old might see Liverpool not as a dead end but as a fresh start. Jones has the technical security and press resistance to thrive in a high-intensity, front-foot style. What he needs is trust, rhythm and a defined job.

That will demand honesty on both sides. Iraola must know whether Jones is genuinely ready to fight for his place or already has one eye on “pastures new”. Jones, in turn, will want to know if the new manager sees him as a starter, a rotation piece, or a saleable asset.

Those private conversations in Kirkby over the coming days could shape not just Jones’ future, but Liverpool’s midfield depth for the season.

3. Shape Ngumoha – and the right flank

Liverpool are scouring the market for wide players, but their targets tell a story. They have triggered a £34.5m release clause for Victor Munoz at Osasuna and signalled to RB Leipzig they would be prepared to go as high as £86m for Yan Diomande. Interest in Bradley Barcola at Paris Saint-Germain remains alive.

All three are most comfortable off the left.

That jars slightly with the bigger strategic question: how do you plan for life after Mohamed Salah on the right of the front three, while spending vast sums on players who prefer the opposite flank?

Inside Liverpool, one possible answer keeps coming up. Rio Ngumoha.

The teenager exploded into the first-team picture last summer, then underlined the hype with his first Premier League goal in that wild 3-2 win at Newcastle United, just days before his 17th birthday. By the end of the campaign he was not just starting for Liverpool but playing for England, delivering a player-of-the-match display against New Zealand in the United States last month and only just missing out on the World Cup squad.

That rise has changed the club’s thinking. Talks over a new contract will follow when he turns 18 in late August, and Liverpool have no intention of letting Bayern Munich, who have been monitoring the situation, get anywhere near him.

The more intriguing debate is positional.

Ngumoha’s cameo for England in America came on the right. In an era obsessed with inverted wingers cutting inside on to their stronger foot, Liverpool are weighing something more old-fashioned: using him as a natural right-sided wideman, going outside his full-back and whipping balls into the box.

There’s a tactical logic. Long term, Liverpool must find a way to unlock £125m striker Alexander Isak and increase the quality of chances he receives. A direct, touchline-hugging right winger feeding him early and often is one route to that.

Ngumoha’s relative inexperience compared to targets like Barcola might actually work in Iraola’s favour. At 17, with only a handful of senior months behind him, he is still malleable. If Iraola sees a different type of winger in him, this is the moment to reshape his game.

His deployment on tour will be telling. Left, right, or drifting between lines – every experiment will offer a clue as to how Liverpool intend to evolve their attack and manage the looming Salah succession.

What Liverpool’s hierarchy admired in Iraola was his reputation at Bournemouth for sharpening young forwards such as Eli Junior Kroupi, Rayan and Antoine Semenyo. Now he inherits one of the most exciting teenage attackers in England, with the tools to become something special.

The question for this summer is simple: does he turn Ngumoha into the next great Liverpool left winger, or the player who redefines their right flank for the next decade?