Nigerian striker Taiwo Awoniyi was signed for Liverpool after graduating from the Imperial Academy in his homeland, believed to have joined for around £400k.
Viewed with the potential to become a first-rate forward at the highest level, Awoniyi was shipped out to Bundesliga 2 side FSV Frankfurt immediately upon his Anfield acquisition, and so began an interminable journey jumping from ship to ship on loan.
Indeed, the 26-year-old remarkably completed seven loan stints while on Liverpool’s books, with the final spell as a wandering nomad, at Union Berlin, resulting in his permanent transfer for around £6m, having never made an appearance for his parent club.
He’d impressed in Germany, scoring five goals and three assists from just 16 starts for Union Berlin during the 2020/21 campaign and following that up the next year with a 20-goal term to grab the attention of Nottingham Forest, who then made their move.
How is Awoniyi performing now?
Last summer, Awoniyi was signed for newly-promoted Forest for around £17.5m and scored 11 times from just 19 starting appearances across all competitions, praised by his manager Steve Cooper for his “bravery” and “commitment”.
Utilised sporadically for much of the first half of the season, Awoniyi really grew into his own at the business end and played an integral role at Forest secured survival on their return to the topflight.
Indeed, the sharpshooter scored six times across his outfit’s final four matches – including the solitary goal in a win over Arsenal – and served as the focal point as a late purple patch did enough to carry the club away from danger and record a 16th-place finish, four points above relegated Leicester City.
After scoring against Liverpool in a 1-0 win that compounded Jurgen Klopp’s side’s woeful start to the season, the one-time Borussia Dortmund boss heralded Awoniyi’s “sensational” development since leaving Merseyside.
How does Awoniyi compare to Mo Salah?
Awoniyi is a prolific goalscorer and is proving under Tricky Trees boss Cooper that he is every bit the forward Liverpool foresaw as they swooped to acquire his services in his formative years.
But he is not of the calibre of Liverpool’s pre-eminent forward under Klopp’s tutelage in Mohamed Salah, who has been one of the most blistering, devastating attackers of the modern age since completing a £34m transfer to Merseyside from Serie A team Roma in 2017.
The superlative inside forward, Salah has redefined the levels of striking prowess attainable for wide forwards, breaking the all-time Premier League record for goals scored (32) in a single season — holding the record for nearly five years before a certain machine named Erling Haaland waltzed onto English shores and scored 36 times in the league.
In fact, the Egyptian has plundered 188 goals and 81 assists from just 309 outings for Liverpool, described by Michael Owen as “one of the greatest of all time.”
Punch
