As much as Liverpool fans all over the world may not like to hear it, it seems Luis Suarez will have packed his bags for Barcelona by this time next week. Regardless of who Liverpool can find to replace him, there is no doubting that a player of Suarez's ability will be missed.
Having said that, a reported £60 - 75 million can buy an awful lot of goals if it is spent correctly. So just how much will the Uruguayan be missed at Anfield?
The Mirror have crunched the numbers and as good as Suarez undoubtedly is, all may not be lost. Taking into account the performances of Liverpool's most fearsome marksmen up until the age of 27 (Suarez's current age), they've shown that Liverpool's best pound for pound goalscorer is between Suarez, Ian Rush and Fernando Torres.
Looking at their goals per game ratio, Torres actually comes out on top with 0.64, closely followed by Suarez on 0.63 and Rush on 0.62. The fact that Rush did that over 224 games, as opposed to Torres' 102 and Suarez's 110, means he is justifiably regarded as Liverpool's best ever striker.
Yet the mere mention of Torres' name in that company shows that it is possible for Suarez to be replaced considering the fact that he himself managed to replace the Spaniard so effectively.
However, the difference between these situations is that Torres had begun to show signs of rustiness during his last six months at Anfield, the same cannot be said of the Uruguayan. As Spurs saw last year, buying quality to replace quality is not necessarily the easiest thing. But if Liverpool can spend the hypothetical Suarez money like they did after Torres' departure, then there's no reason why things have to grind to a halt for Brendan Rodgers' side.
