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Steven Gerrard was instantly proven right in his call for Arne Slot to bring Rio Ngumoha into the Liverpool starting lineup for the clash with Wolves in the FA Cup on Friday night.
The 17-year-old took the place of Hugo Ekitike in the frontline from the defeat to Wolves earlier in the week in the Premier League, taking up the left-wing role while moving Cody Gakpo centrally. Ngumoha has shown glimpses of quality in his breakout campaign at senior level, though he has largely received minutes from the bench.
The youngster had picked up 414 minutes across all competitions this season, the highlight of which was a last-minute winner over Newcastle United in the Premier League. With Liverpool's struggles in front of goal in recent weeks, there has been a growing call to bring Ngumoha into the mix to help improve the side's creativity.
Those calls have only grown louder after the Reds' frustrating defeat to Wolves in midweek, with Gerrard among those believing the England youth international deserved a chance to shine in the FA Cup against the same opposition. He said on TNT Sports in midweek: "He has to start Ngumoha now.
He continued: "He’s doing more in a small space of time than Gakpo is doing in 60 minutes."
Ngumoha was given that opportunity to shine at Molineux in the second game by starting on the left, and he took it with both hands. On the BBC's coverage, the Liverpool starlet was given the Player of the Match award by former player Stephen Warnock, who sang his praises.
Warnock said: "Rio Ngumoha. Brilliant display from him tonight. Big opportunity for him, he's taken it with both hands, given his manager Arne Slot a big decision to make on Tuesday night against Galatasaray."
The winger finished the match with four shots, two of which were on target, along with a 75% dribble success rate and three fouls won in a productive night on the left. He was consistently sharp, even if he didn't get in on the scoring that came from Andy Robertson, Mohamed Salah and Curtis Jones.
It was a much-needed victory for Liverpool to not only banish the demons of Tuesday night's defeat at Molineux, but to keep their hopes of winning a trophy alive as well as regaining some form. While the first half felt like a repeat of that frustrating midweek encounter, the second half had plenty more promising signs, particularly from a creative front.
Now the pressure is on Slot to decide whether he sticks with Ngumoha starting on the left against Galatasaray next week in the Champions League, or whether he reverts to his usual left flank that contains Gakpo. However, the manager may have already put a dampener on his plans with the exciting star with his claim just last week.
He said on the growing calls for him to start: "Let’s be clear, he is a special player that will have more playing time and already has more playing time recently. If everyone thinks he is so good, then he should be in something to talk about again.
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"If he is already good enough to play for us, then he should definitely be, in your opinion. 100% (mindful over lack of under-21s football) - that is what makes it so difficult at the age of these two players (Ngumoha and Trey Nyoni) and where they are at in their development.
"(They are) good enough to come in or to play for us, to be on the bench, (with) our squad not being big enough. So we always need them on the bench and that also means that if you look at his playing time and Trey’s playing time, overall that has not been enough to develop a player ideally in a better way.
"But that is the downside of having injuries, the downside of they are a bit too good (for the under-21s). Because it would be better for a 17, 18-year-old, because no-one talks about Trey, which is correct because Rio had his special moment, but Trey's development is just as interesting in my opinion. That is the difficult balance for me to find."
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