Nicolas Jackson and Darwin Nunez feel chaotically linked but one is proving himself an accomplished Premier League forward and the other plays for Liverpool.
It feels like perception and reality are rarely quite so diametrically opposed in football as they are with Nicolas Jackson.
A 23-year-old with remarkably limited prior professional experience scoring 18 goals and providing eight assists in 42 appearances in a new league under two different managers would not ordinarily be cause for constant ridicule. But a £32m fee he did not set and the crisis-adjacent nature of Chelsea over the past two years has made Jackson the prime subject for rival scoffs and sneers.
It is a respectable record for any club, never mind one building on such uncertain foundations. Jackson in particular has been expected to perform under a perpetual scrutiny few other players have been exposed to.
Even after starting the season with four goals and three assists – only a dozen players can beat that so far across Europe’s top five leagues – the focus is on who Chelsea should replace the Senegalese with in January to inspire a title push neither predicted in the summer, nor particularly realistic to carry far beyond the winter if indeed at all.
It is a reflex Chelsea have undeniably encouraged. The holistic nature of squad building can render the line between incompetence and ingenuity almost undetectable, which is to say that only recently has it been possible to make much proper sense of Clearlake’s sustained extravagant spending and relentless recruitment. They appear to have done it almost accidentally at times but one of the most potent attacks in the world has been constructed either way. And while Cole Palmer is the heart and soul of it, Jackson has become the poster boy for taking a delectable mess of raw ingredients and gradually refining the recipe over time.
Yet even throughout the summer Chelsea’s targeting of another centre-forward was public knowledge. Their scouting department must be nodding sagely at the career eruption of Jhon Duran and continued development of Samu Omorodion. The Blues’ strategy has not always been clear but in terms of talent identification those teething problems have been carefully treated with a fair few implants, not even all from Brighton.
They might still have a folder on Darwin Nunez, albeit one quickly gathering dust. Liverpool turned down an approach for the Uruguayan from Stamford Bridge more than a year ago and might be regretting their haste.
The Jurgen Klopp pet project has been abandoned by Arne Slot. While the Liverpool laptop gurus championed Christopher Nkunku in summer 2022 it was the German who successfully pushed for Nunez instead in not only a rare show of managerial autocracy at Anfield but a lack of forward planning. Liverpool at their operational peak would never have sanctioned a move built on vibes rather than data but doing so shortly before said manager’s departure and saddling his successor with someone else’s £64m burden is the sort of trait most associated with a certain type of capricious club. Sunday’s opponents, for example.
Slot has managed the Klopp handover wonderfully while keeping the Nunez conundrum low down on his list of priorities despite inheriting the composite parts of an elite centre-forward; those pieces have been assembled for more than twice as many Uruguay minutes as Liverpool ones this season and the only surprise is that Nunez has played that much for his club.
Chelsea might have been the perfect home. Jackson has started every game and benefited from a patience not shown towards most Blues managers. His competition for places is not as intense but the two players once described by Gary Neville as “handfuls” who do “a lot of running” and “harass people” but are “just a little bit scruffy” in front of goals are on wildly different trajectories currently.
While it increasingly feels as though Liverpool should consider cutting their losses on Nunez, the progress of Jackson at Chelsea has gone under the radar. His high ceiling was already common knowledge but the floor for performance levels has been pulled up in a way seemingly beyond his chaos sibling on Merseyside.
