Most new signings arrive hoping to win something with their new club eventually. Victor Munoz turned up with a World Cup winner's medal already in his pocket.
Liverpool's move for the Osasuna winger was quick, a little cheeky, and very on-brand for a club trying to reassert itself under a new manager. Here's everything worth knowing about their newest attacker.
Liverpool triggered Munoz's release clause at Osasuna for a fee just over £34m, completing a deal that had actually been agreed with Newcastle first. Iraola's side swooped in and got it done — a deal made easier by Iraola's deep knowledge of Spanish football from his time coaching in LaLiga, which reportedly accelerated Liverpool's interest once he took the Anfield job. Munoz underwent his medical with Liverpool's staff in the United States, fitting the deal in around his World Cup commitments with Spain.
Munoz's path to Anfield runs through two of Spanish football's biggest academies. Born in Barcelona, he came through La Masia before switching to Real Madrid's youth setup, where his path to regular first-team football was blocked and limited to occasional substitute appearances. A move to Osasuna last summer, for an initial fee of around €5m with Real Madrid retaining a sell-on clause, gave him the regular football he needed — and he made the most of it, racking up seven goals and five assists in 34 appearances across all competitions and forcing his way into Spain's senior squad along the way.
Munoz is a genuine two-way attacking threat, comfortable as either a winger or through the middle as a forward, built around real pace and directness. Data from his breakout Osasuna season had him ranking among the best in his league for high-intensity distance covered, dribbles completed, and shot accuracy — the profile of a player who causes problems in transition as much as in settled attack. At 22, with his frame still filling out, there's a reasonable expectation he adds even more physically over the next couple of seasons.
His senior Spain debut, back in March, could hardly have gone better — he scored in a 3-0 friendly win over Serbia on his very first appearance for the national team.
Munoz was part of Spain's World Cup-winning squad this summer, an unused substitute across all eight matches as Spain went unbeaten and conceded just a single goal on their way to the title. It's an unusual case: a genuine World Cup winner's medal arriving at Anfield attached to a player who hasn't kicked a competitive ball for the club yet. However he ultimately fits into Iraola's plans, he arrives with a taste of exactly the kind of pressure and occasion Liverpool will be hoping to compete for again.
With Salah gone and the right side of Liverpool's attack still being reshaped — and Barcola's move still unresolved — Munoz's versatility across the front line makes him a genuinely useful piece regardless of how the rest of the window plays out. Whether Iraola uses him wide or through the middle, the early signs from his Osasuna season suggest a player capable of contributing goals and creativity from day one, once he's settled in.