Telegraph reckons we could be in now. Sign him up and send Tevez back to BA on leave for six months to see Brenda Aznicar - whoops sorry, his children!
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/sport/rory ... ly-effect/?
Liverpool fear losing Fernando Torres to Carlos Tevez's butterfly effect
If anything has been proven at all four days on from the dawn of Tevez-gate, it is that Carlos is more of a sensitive butterfly than his heart-on-sleeve, streetfighter demeanour suggested. Either he misses his family, spending his days pining for the sound of a child’s laughter, lashings of dulce de leche and a gourd of mate, or he dislikes Garry Cook (perhaps indicating he doesn’t like the sound of a child’s laughter all that much). Something, certainly, has put the game’s most delicate Argentinean butterfly into a multi-million pound flap. The question the rest of football must now ask is where the subsequent tornado will land.
Initial suggestions seem to be that it will be Wolfsburg, lair of Edin Dzeko, the Bosnian striker Manchester City have long coveted. More reticent observers have pointed that it may simply serve to blow the cobwebs away from Emmanuel Adebayor’s career. On Merseyside, though, there is a lingering fear that it will twist and twirl its way down the M62 and hit Anfield, seat of Fernando Torres.
The link between City and Torres first surfaced 18 months ago, perhaps more. Then, though, there was nothing to lure the striker, driven by medals more than money, to Eastlands, what with Liverpool having recently finished a close second to Manchester United and seemingly set to emerge as a genuine force once more. By last summer, much of that had changed, but still the striker remained unconvinced. Moving to Manchester would not have offered him Champions League football; whether Roberto Mancini would be able to craft a title-challenging side from his expensive raw materials remained uncertain.
Chelsea, to Torres, was always the more attractive option, though no substantive bid materialised. Liverpool, regardless, were determined to retain their most prized asset, eventually persuading him that the future was bright enough to endure the shadows of the present. He produced a statement pledging allegiance to the club, and the matter seemed to be resolved.
Fast forward five months and the certainty, the hope which infused Anfield at the news of Torres’s commitment has dissipated. If Tevez leaves, either in January or the summer, City will need a marquee signing to pacify fans and alleviate concerns that they cannot keep hold of the game’s biggest stars, that they remain forever cursed to stand on the outside looking in, the plebeian parvenus not invited to dine with the elite. Torres, more than Dzeko, fits that bill. A renewed attempt on his loyalty would come as no surprise.
In a season in which footballers’ reputation for fidelity has taken more of a battering than ever before, that Torres may not finish his career at Anfield is hardly a shock. That Anfield may not feel the hurt it once would have done at such a prospect is, perhaps, somewhat more startling.
Torres will face Utrecht tonight but he is comparatively unlikely to hear his name sung or see his legions of fans bouncing in his honour. They used to. Not any more. It would be easy to observe that there could be no starker evidence that supporters are no less fickle than players these days, that a few good performances from Torres would have his public genuflecting before him once more. It is an unfair assessment. More than his lack of form, it is Torres’s lack of heart that is beginning to stir the first signs of disapproval from those who see him every week.
It is telling that, in his statement to the Daily Telegraph today, Tevez’s “advisor” Kia Joorabchian was at pains to stress that his “client” would not dream of offering anything less than his full effort every time he trained with or played for City, despite “his” desire to leave. Joorabchian knows what fans value. They can stand poor form or rotten luck, so long as application is evident. With Torres, it is not. He looks like he has had enough, like he has given up. Anfield will not tolerate such an attitude, not for long.
Here, then, another note of caution that Joorabchian might be able to tip Torres’s way. Rooney’s brand and Tevez’s brand, both such money-spinning ventures, have been affected by their transfer sagas; they were, after all, dressed up as the urchins who would play for free if they needed to. They won’t, it turns out, not by a long chalk. Ditto Torres: he has been marketed as the boy next door superstar, the shy, unassuming kid from Fuenlabrada with the world at his feet. That image, no less than his fans’ patience, withers with every sullen glance, every halted run. Move from Anfield on a low note and he will seem more of a mercenary than is good for business. That is the thing with a butterfly effect: its outcome tends to be chaotic.
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