Andoni Iraola and his Liverpool coaches will be hard at work this November international break as they prepare to face Manchester United at Anfield next Sunday.

United will pose a threat under new boss Mauricio Pochettino, and despite heading into the break with a 3-1 win over Crystal Palace, Iraola still has plenty to perfect for the Reds.

One thing the Basque and his Liverpool coaching team have started to get right has been exactly how to help Florian Wirtz get back to being his best self. Wirtz has been better recently and scored again for Germany on Friday night as they saw off Serbia.

The goal will be another confidence boost for a player who has come under such scrutiny since arriving for £116m in 2025, but after watching him find the net and generally impress against the Serbians, former Germany boss Jurgen Klinsmann says Wirtz still looks like a different player for the national team. The challenge now for Iraola and his coaches is to bring that out of him back on Merseyside.

Andoni Iraola needs to help Florian Wirtz settle

There are many reasons why Wirtz has not been able to show his true colours consistently at Liverpool, with the upheaval and tragedy at the club shortly after his arrival last summer usually cited as one of the main contributing factors.

It is sometimes hard enough to settle in a new country as a young player regardless of your price-tag and reputation, but the death of Diogo Jota and the subsequent impact on the Liverpool squad and their performances clearly played a part in Wirtz struggling.

It is not that he has always shone for the national team in the meantime, but the 23-year-old has undoubtedly been better in a Germany shirt. According to Klinsmann, that is simply down to Wirtz feeling settled in his environment, something which his coaches and the people around him at Liverpool must now help him become at Anfield.

“You are a different person depending on your environment,” the former striker told ESPN. “Obviously he came to Leverkusen, had some fantastic years there and for this incredible amount of money got transferred to Liverpool. Everybody expected him to be the same player in Liverpool as he was in Leverkusen, or when he plays for the German national team, then you have some injury problems and suddenly you feel like you’re in the wrong spot.”

“The challenge now for the coaching staff at Liverpool is how can we make him as happy in Liverpool as he was with Bayer Leverkusen or with the German team. But also how can this player himself be honest to himself and challenge himself and say ‘I understand I need to step it up here in Liverpool. I have more to give, more to offer, I am a difference maker.’

“It seems so far he hasn’t reached that level in Liverpool,” Klinsmann added. “As soon as he gets back to his home environment in the national team he’s all smiling, he’s all happy, he’s all creative, he’s basically the footballer to make a difference on the field.

“There is no guarantee with these big transfers, if you transfer Lamine Yamal from Barcelona to Man City there’s absolutely zero guarantee that he’s the same Lamine Yamal in Man City as he is in Barcelona because the area is different, the food is different, the environment is different, the people around you are different and you may be not as happy as you were before.”

For Wirtz’s part, he does seem happy at Liverpool and there is no suggestion at all that he regrets taking the bold decision to snub Bayern Munich and leave Germany when joining the Reds last year.

Hopefully with better performances the No. 7 will feel more at ease. But there is certainly a part Iraola and his staff can play in that, and with no more national team duties on the calendar until March, they must rise to the challenge of helping Wirtz feel just as happy at club level as he is with his country.