Do we like them?

Do we like Florian Wirtz?

Our score: 7 out of 10. Nothing harmful turned up and there are a couple of small kind acts, but the record is thin, so it stops short of the top end.

Wirtz was born on 3 May 2003 into a football family. His dad chairs the club he started at, SV Grün-Weiß Brauweiler, before he moved to Cologne's academy and won an under-19 Bundesliga title in 2017. He was only a teenager when Leverkusen picked him up, and he made his league debut as their youngest ever player.

The closest thing to a scandal is club politics, not him. The 2020 move from Cologne to Leverkusen drew complaints from Cologne about a broken gentleman's agreement, and the 2025 move to Liverpool, a record fee reported at up to £116 million, brought plenty of transfer noise. No court case, fine or misconduct claim against him turned up in our searches.

On the harm test, there's honestly not much to report. We found no comments on LGBTQ+ people, women, migrants, vaccines or the climate, no political campaigning and no tie to anyone pushing harm. That means we can't say he's an ally, only that nothing nasty is on the record. His PepsiCo ad deal is the usual footy-star stuff.

This season's heat has been about form, not conduct. Former Chelsea striker Tony Cascarino told talkSPORT in April that Wirtz was “a showboater”, after a heavy loss to Manchester City, while conceding he was “hugely talented lad”. A couple of months later Chris Sutton said, “He was a real menace with Jamal Musiala” as Germany thrashed Curaçao at the World Cup. That's the sort of criticism every footballer cops.

The good stuff is small but real. In December 2024 a shot of his deflected and hit a steward on the head, and Wirtz leapt the advertising hoarding to check on him, which got him nominated for the Bundesliga's Fair Play award. In 2023 his match-worn shirt was the top seller at a Leverkusen charity auction that raised €150,000 for research into a rare childhood disease.

So: young, talented, no mess and a couple of decent moments. We'd happily have him on the team. We'd just love to hear him speak up for something off the pitch.