Fernando Torres is certainly at a crossroads in his career where he's walking a fine line in being considered a bust for Chelsea, in the same light as Shevchenko was. Can he turn it around?
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| Once known as one of the world's most feared striker, Torres is now scraping for 1st team action at Chelsea. |
When Fernando Torres finally made his big move to Liverpool in the Summer of 2007 after being courted by some of Europe's largest clubs. The striker nicknamed "El Nino" was lauded as the player who would help Liverpool reclaim the league title and their first English Premier League crown. He proved to worth the penny early on as he went on to score 24 league goals for Liverpool in his first season abroad. However, despite impressing and scoring effectively for Liverpool, they were unable to attain a league title during his tenure with the club which was marred by lingering injuries. In the end, Torres left the club for rivals Chelsea which left fans with a bitter image of Torres.
Chelsea paid the price for Torres though and they got their man for 50 million pounds during the January transfer window of 2010. Despite losing their main striker, Liverpool still came away with a nice profit although it was up to this point poorly spent as most of it went towards a deal to acquire a young English striker by the name of Andy Caroll, however, that's a story for another time. Torres stood by his decision to request a move to Chelsea feeling that Liverpool was undergoing some turbulent times with the dismissal of former manager Rafael Benitez and ongoing cash flow issues. Torres simply said that his move was motivated by the chance of winning more silverware and that Chelsea offered him such an opportunity.
Torres' arrival was just as big of a move for Chelsea as it was for Chelsea who had a lethal striker of their own in Didier Drogba but at a bit an older age thus signaling perhaps a switch. However, Torres made it difficult to drop Drogba during his first Spring tenure with Chelsea and only managed to score 1 league goal in 14 appearances for the club as they feel 2nd to Manchester United. However, Torres' lack of consistency was still not being widely reported as many expected him to bounce back in the following season where he'd have a full league season to show his skill and worth.
That hasn't necessarily occurred.
Now with the second half of the 2011-2012 season underway, Torres has only amounted 2 league goals in 17 appearances. Furthermore, his frustration is beginning to show more and more as each match passes. Torres is experiencing many unlucky moments; however, they've also been complimented with plenty of poor finishes which equates to one horrid situation. Recently, Spain National Team Manager Vicente del Bosque has been questioned on the Torres situation and has also shown some worry in his form to the point that his spot on Spain's Euro 2012 roster may be in jeopardy; a miss out on Euro 2012 would be disastrous for Torres who scored the winning goal for Spain at Euro 2008. However, Torres may very well be receiving some luck in the fact that Spain may be without their other prized striker David Villa, who broke his leg and is currently working against the clock to be fit for the tournament which would all the likely lead del Bosque to include Torres.
Regardless of that, we're still brought back to the same question, what has happened to Fernando Torres? Will he ever be able to regain his goal scoring ability or will Chelsea bail?
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