Fernando Torres' move from Liverpool to Chelsea was a massive deal when it happened, but ultimate there was no winner as Liverpool lost one of their most important players who was then loved by the fans, Chelsea spent £50m on a striker who couldn't produce, and the Spaniard has his confidence well and truly shot.
The situation was an ugly one. Liverpool fans burned jerseys, lashed out at him on social media, and booed Torres anytime he played against his former team, but now the player at the centre of it all has revealed that he felt betrayed by Liverpool for portraying him as a traitor.
Torres made the comments in a new book by Simon Hughes entitled “Ring of Fire: Liverpool FC into the 21st Century – the players’ stories”, and it seems as though he is genuinely upset with how things turned out.
Comolli told me that the new owners (FSG), they had an idea of how to spend their investment.
They wanted to bring in young players, to build something new. I was thinking to myself, this takes time to work. It takes two, three, four, maybe even 10 years.
I didn’t have that time. I was 27 years old. I did not have time to wait. I wanted to win. Here we are five years later and they are still trying to build – around the same position in the league as when I left.
It was presented as if I was a traitor, it was not like this in the discussion(s).
Liverpool could not admit they were doing something wrong with the whole team. They had to find a guilty one.
On one hand, it's clear that Liverpool's shift in transfer policy at that time was a failed experiment and it is understandable that Torres, having seen what was going to happen, wanted to move on, but at the same time, he was 27, so the idea that time was running out is a strange one.
When the offer came in, it made sense for Liverpool if the plan was to invest in youth, and for Torres is was supposed to allow him to compete for titles, but it's difficult to imagine how Torres wished the club would have spin his departure in any other way.
While the fans have forgiven him somewhat, mostly due to the lack of impact he had at Chelsea, there will always be a bit of hurt lingering.
