Former Ireland captain Kenny Cunningham has doubled-down on his criticisms of Fabinho's defensive capabilities.

"It was obviously a brilliant individual goal, that was fantastic, but put that to the side," he cautioned, speaking to OTB AM.

Cunningham was responding to Liverpool fans and ex-pros taking issue with his critic of the midfielder on Off The Ball last week.

Here's exactly what he had to say:

"Looking at the goals Liverpool have conceded this season, it has been down to Fabinho's lack of alertness"

A very good player, but Kenny Cunningham isn't sure if Fabinho is the man to stop Manchester City | #OTBAM

Full chat 👉 https://t.co/fhSaiOe3yq pic.twitter.com/0VA722zsZY

— Off The Ball (@offtheball) November 6, 2019

"If you want to talk about Fabinho, his performance yesterday typified what I was talking about, in terms of his strengths and his weaknesses," he added in the wake of Liverpool's win over Manchester City.

"If you look at the defensive side of his game yesterday, don’t get clouded by the fact that it was a great victory for Liverpool.

"He should have got booked after 20 minutes, Gundogan dropped his shoulder and went past him - and that's the lack of mobility, you could see it there.

"He couldn’t plant his feet and recover so he actually hacked him down."

Cunningham saw more warning signs: "If you look at the couple of chances City got in the first half, De Bruyne put a ball through his legs for Angelino - who hit the post.

"De Bruyne spun him on the halfway line - he tied to win a ball in front, got it wrong, and De Bruyne spun away from him and played Aguero in and he shot across the goal."

Kaka, Brazil, in action against Republic of Ireland's Kenny Cunningham, Sportsfile

"And even in the second half, Sterling danced around him a couple of times and possibly could have scored. De Bruyne's done him on the outside and put a ball across the penalty box for Aguero who should have scored.

"Even the goal that Manchester City scored, I thought that he was a little bit weak in his defence against De Bruyne inside the box."

"That’s just off the top of my head.”

Fabinho pros

The 72-cap Irish international stressed that he's not calling Fabinho a bad player and highlighted his positive attributes in possession.

However, Cunningham warned that modern title-winning sides have stronger defensive midfielders than the Liverpool No. 3.

“It’s interesting, you look at successful championship-winning teams, maybe in the last 10 years, Fernandinho is probably the best example at Manchester City how strong he is defensively.

"Kante at Leicester and Chelsea even back to Matic at Chelsea - all better defenders than Fabinho in that central area of the pitch."