No More Heroes Anymore…?

‘Whatever happened to all the heroes?’ sneered Hugh Cornwell and the Stranglers slap bang in the middle of Liverpool’s great era of European Cup Heroes (note the capital), Souness, Keegan, Thompson, Grobelaar, Clemence, Neal, Rush and of course – the returned King himself, the inimitable Kenny Dalglish. In perhaps what could be termed the third wave of  European Cup Heroes came Gerrard, Alonso, Garcia, Hamann, Hyppia, Dudek, Carragher and the unlikely but always welcome, Vladimir Smicer. Fernando Torres was supposed to be in the running to join this valhalla of champions – having  joined in a wave of enthusiasm, from the fans, the talk (and wonderful ‘bounce’ song) was of  his ‘armband proving he was a red’ of his having such deep respect for the club, its history, its fans : ‘I told Atleti that I was not interested in a move unless it came from Liverpool – that was a club I could only dream of playing for’ wonderfully rousing words that filled the sails of the fans who were waiting like westerly breezes on a becalmed sea – a spectacular goal on his debut against ironically, Chelsea, sealed the bond of worship between Torres and the fans – the words made solid, a new era had begun.  Given his pronouncements on Chelsea TV today, the most telling thing about those original statements now is how strongly they suddenly smell of bullshit.

He was not a Scouser, though he was never slow to ally himself with the fans and city natives in a way that was as endearing at the time as it seems manipulative now. Nobody expects someone to come to somewhere like Liverpool from Spain, Argentina, Brazil, Italy – wherever, stay forever and love the wet, colder climate, a city still in a state of great if at times characterless renewal and fall in love with it all…not really, though some do. Xabi Alonso, first great player of the Benitez era (and no doubt one of his ‘flops’ who somehow still managed to generate more than 3 times what we paid for him) was beloved of the fans – even fans of other teams thought him a class and cultured act. The argument of how and why he left still rumbles on among fans – yet to a man and woman they still love him – and he still talks of his special love for the team,. the city and the culture. One staffer at Liverpool told a friend of mine that Alonso has kept a flat on in the city – and certainly when Madrid are not playing, he can often be spotted at Liverpool games – home or away. So maybe some slightly older heroes do prevail.

Football is a short career, even if you’re a long-lasting keeper at the top-level, often made shorter by injury, loss of form, poor choices, indiscipline or John Terry’s wandering cock – all fans know this – even though the discussion of overpaid prima donnas is a common one in hostelries, living rooms and workplaces the length and breadth of the land, it is accepted generally that players will move on and that sometimes it will all be a bit fractious etc. Carlos Tevez moving to City, Javier Mascherano leaving Liverpool, Emmanuel Adebayor leaving Arsenal – but aside from Rooney leaving Everton for the Filth, nothing has come close to the Torres debacle.  The fans loved him – the club, which has had its own crises of  earthquake proportions ever since former owner David ‘Whoops!’ Moores and Rick ‘Coco’ Parry with the aid of a legal, commercial and advisory team that combined somehow couldn’t spot a pair of snake-oil salesman in Hicks and Gillett that had the welfare of Liverpool football club at heart in the same way George Osborne has the welfare of those funny, ill-dressed people who ride around on buses at heart – you know,  the poor.  Like Fernando Torres, his notions and experiences of being ‘in it together’ may differ hugely from those he espouses to be in it together with.

With a shedload of sponsors, merchandising deals both in the UK, Spain and wider world, you would think careful and well marketed PR would be an essential. Chelsea, despite Abramovich’s dwindling roubles still have a small global following – pre Torres post Istanbul, Liverpool’s following was believed to be around 25 million globally, nearer  40 million since with the steady growth of interest in televised English football and it’s most successful ever club (that’s right, Liverpool – NOT Manchester United) throughout asia, the middle east and the growth market of India. A quick trip to Twitter alone will show how radically Torres has isolated a huge chunk of his global market and his sponsors clients.

So why did he move? The club, as has been said, under the ownership of Hicks and Gillett was in a crisis of debt, under or no investment. with profits funding debt or being slewed into Cayman island or Delaware bank accounts. However, after one of the great footballing will-they-won’t-they transatlantic dramas, played out in courtrooms, solicitors offices, hotel rooms on twitter and by mobile device finally changed hands with the cancerous Hicks and Gillett replaced by the debt-wiping, sharp-minded and well resourced NESV, a team known to hunt down success rather than milk cash cows. To sweeten the deal, Hicks and Gillett not only got nothing for the club, they lost around £140m between them. Justice can be sweet – but not fattening.  However, one last malignant wart from their era remained once Christian ‘Championship Manager’ Purslow had been removed (we really would have ended up in the Championship had he been allowed to continue in post)  – his indescribably poor appointment of the mediocrity of  footballing mediocrities Roy Hodgson when replacing the supposedly autocratic but nonetheless brilliant Rafa Benitez. It is true that Hodgson was the anti-Torres…he was the anti-LFC, really. but Hodgson was finally gone before he was allowed to buy more shite in the transfer window – players in his mold – ‘athletic hoofers’, rather than the sublimely gifted or skillful. Torres was not the only player unhappy with Hodgson. His erstwhile great friend Pepe Reina, Centre Back Daniel Agger, midfielder Lucas Leiva, Glen Johnson – in the end, just about everyone (except perhaps some of the older, ‘English contingent’) had long since had enough of Hodgson – even the crowd chanted for Kenny Dalglish to return in Hodgson’s place – and in that, his bewilderingly negative and self-unaware press conferences allied to his piss-poor results, his end was inevitable. And so it came to pass that on the morning of 8 January, 2011 and with a hefty cheque in his lawyers briefcase, Roy ‘Mediocre’ Hodgson was ‘mutualed’ Torres in particular was seen to be ‘not unhappy’ at this turn of events.

The King returned – FSG, that part of NESV that looked after LFC declared there was no need to sell – we could happily ‘increase the pay roll’. Despite the generally underwhelming Ryan Babel‘s exit, this seemed to be true – we returned to ‘The Liverpool Way’ – business behind closed doors, but it became obvious that several younger ‘star’ quality players were being actively sought. The future looked good. Under Dalglish, the performances began to pick up immediately and even the results began doing the same shortly after – Liverpool reached 7th –  their highest position in the league so far in short order. Then came the news Liverpool were serious about acquiring the young Uruguayan World class forward and nutter, Luis Alberto Suárez – primarily to partner Torres, who it had long been reasoned needed help up front, despite the incredible partnership developed with Gerrard of 18 months earlier. What had mostly been ignored or excused by the fans was the number of small niggling injuries or the frequent and growing displays of petulance. I remember early on in Torres Anfield tenure him chasing down defenders. stealing the ball and breaking in on goal. That stopped way back – in the last 18 months if he lost the ball, he mostly lost interest. He wanted an operation on his niggling injury to make sure he was sorted for the World cup – he missed such a huge chunk of the season that his lack may have been a substantive factor in the loss of  Liverpool’s best manager (Benitez) since Dalglish Part One, and ergo dressing the set for Liverpool’s very own near inevitable Götterdämmerung.

And yet…despite a clear end of the travails of the last three years and the robust show of a new beginning, it was only AFTER Liverpool had a bid accepted by Ajax for Suarez, the man identified to play alongside Torres, that Torres decided it was time to jump ship and handed in a Transfer request. His claims about the club not moving forward quick enough, and not showing enough ambition in the transfer market (the new owners had been in place less than 3 whole months still with no new CEO, and yet had sacked his bette noir in Hodgson and spent more money in the crap transfer window, breaking the club record twice  – than ever before. The excuses, the ‘reasons’, the timing – none of it stacked up.

It’s widely believed that certain meetings on a certain yacht with certain representatives of a certain footballer and a certain short Siberian shit at a certain recent world cup secured this move from a long way out – and that much of  Torres’ sulking, pulling of a big lip and general indifference on the field of play was the outcome of done deal behind southern ocean served caviar and iced vodka…and yet, Torres stated his commitment to Liverpool on 3 August, saying “My commitment and loyalty to the club and to the fans is the same as it was on my first day when I signed’, and again on 9  January 2011 ‘More than ever, we need to stick together. We must live in the present, from match to match. We need to add more points, win matches and improve our standing in the table. That is our challenge and I demand the total help of our supporters in doing that. My head is in Liverpool and on helping save our season. I am professional and I always fulfil my deals. I haven’t considered leaving, although in football that depends on the club. Liverpool had a lot of success under Rafa Benitez and that is difficult for anyone to follow’.

Inspiring words…less then 3 weeks and one transfer request later, he’s gone.  ‘The target for every footballer is to play at one of the top-level clubs in the world, and I can do that (at Chelsea) now, so I am very, very happy. Chelsea are the kind of tem which I like to play against because they motivate me, but they’re also the kind of team I want to play for, because they’re one of the biggest teams in Europe and they’re always fighting for everything. I just want to be at the level that I’m supposed to stay at. It’s a great club, and everyone is expecting good things out of me. I am prepared and ready for the challenge.’

A brand, not a soul. His name, song and flags of worship will be taken down forever, replaced at his new home by plastic freebies and general acceptance  – even indifference, but not love, not the adoration he had at Liverpool where his future was to have been as big as, maybe even bigger than one of the clubs own sons and demigods – Steven Gerrard – possibly one day in the hearts of the faithful breathing the same rarefied air as the clubs greatest ever player and current manager, Kenny Dalglish – the same Kenny Dalglish who spoke reprovingly in the wake of Torres’ departure, that no one is bigger than the club.

In the end, there are still Heroes – big and small, Luis Suarez in his excitement has made a fine impression thus far – Andy Carroll, less so – early days, maybe.

On twitter, a single retweeted tweet caught my eye along the lines of : ‘I wanna wish Liverpool all the luck and I hope they will end in top 4 where they belong at the end of the season’. A fan – hopeful of an upturn under the King? No – it was from a player unadored largely by the fans in his tenure at the club, also recently ended, only he didn’t have excuses made for his lacklustre performances, his apparent lack of effort, his mistakes. Ryan Babel – for it was his tweet, for all his ire gathered from the fans (which he accepted, manfully) understood. he got us. He will be remembered with some fondness, his better moments smiled and debated over in The Albert in post game bevvies.

The many more goals, brilliant record-breaking moments and skills of Fernando Torres – how will they be remembered? Ask another predecessor – Michael Owen.

The look in Fernando Torres’ eyes on his CFCtv interview, stoney-faced, unsure and pensive would suggest maybe he knows somethings will never be the same again already.