Víctor Muñoz won the World Cup this summer. He also barely played a minute of it. Those two facts sitting side by side tell you everything about what kind of few months he's had.
The 23-year-old left Osasuna for Liverpool in a £34.5 million move mid-tournament — already a dizzying thing to process — while simultaneously watching his body refuse to hold up at the biggest stage in football. "I had tough moments," he said at a Spain press conference this week. "You spend a season doing things well, you get the reward of going to the World Cup, and then you feel your body can't give any more and doesn't reach that match. It keeps relapsing, things drag on, and you never feel 100% at any point in the tournament."
That's a brutal way to experience a winners' medal.
A fast start hiding a complicated picture
Back on the pitch, Muñoz has looked sharp. He scored on his full Premier League debut against Nottingham Forest in August, and earned his competitive Spain debut off the bench in their 4-1 win over Croatia earlier this week — his third international cap overall, having netted on his debut against Serbia back in March.
He's adapting quickly, and he knows why. "Where I notice the biggest difference compared to past years is the intensity of the training sessions and all that physical work. Honestly, it's very demanding over there and it's helping me grow." The Premier League grind, brutal as it is for adjusting players, seems to be working in his favour rather than against him.
That said, his path to regular Spain minutes is genuinely difficult. Lamine Yamal and Nico Williams aren't moving aside for anyone right now, and Spain's attacking depth across their 26-man squad for this Nations League window is considerable. Muñoz didn't even make the matchday squad against England. He came off the bench against Croatia. He might start against Czechia on Saturday — de la Fuente is expected to rotate with four fixtures packed into the expanded window — but consistent selection is a different conversation entirely.
Learning from Yamal, waiting for his moment
To his credit, Muñoz isn't pretending the competition doesn't exist. "He's a good friend of mine who is with me day-to-day," he said of Yamal. "Being able to have that competition, being able to see him train every day, is honestly a full privilege for me." Whether that translates into actual cap accumulation this season is the real question.
From a Liverpool perspective, the early signs justify the fee. A winger who can operate in the Premier League's physical environment, contribute in both directions, and hold his own in Spain squads stacked with elite wide players is a serious asset. His availability odds for key Premier League fixtures are worth monitoring — the injury history from this summer isn't ancient history yet.
"I'm in a good moment both at Liverpool and here with the national team," he said. The challenge now is making that moment last long enough to actually become something.
