Great Moments in Liverpool History Part 1: The Empire Strikes Back

Premier League Chelsea 0-1 Liverpool 2011,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdZPq_jYakI

“I’ve always wanted to move to a big club, and now I can say I’ve done it” – Fernando Torres, 31^st of January 2011

Never would a Liverpool game on paper mean so little, but in reality mean so much.

The week leading up to this game was one of the most emotional and challenging ones a Liverpool fan has had to face for a long time.

Of course, we had had lots of bad weeks recently. This was the season where we took our hated owners to court after all. It was when we lost to Blackpool and Wolves at home and had to endure the ultimate insult of having Roy Hodgson manage us.

But this week was challenging on a different level. This week was not about off the field issues or on field results. Nor was it about disastrous managerial appointments.

But, in reality, this week was the culmination of all of that. All the bad decisions, the debt loaded onto the club and the awful performances directly led us to the moment where every single Liverpool fan asked themselves a question they never thought they’d have to ask before:

Are we still a big club?

You see, on January 28^th 2011, the unthinkable happened. Fernando Torres, the most beloved Liverpool player for a generation and the player who scored 50 goals for the club faster than anyone else put in a transfer request.

And demanded to move to Chelsea.

Now, we’ve seen our top players go before. Every club has. But Liverpool, in my lifetime, have never sold one of its best players to a rival English club. Never. The closest they came was when they sold Robbie Fowler to Leeds in 2001- but that was very much a club decision, not an enforced one.

A top player putting in a transfer request at the dying embers of the transfer window in order to push a move to a rival club?

Unthinkable.

 Unbelievable.

And what made it worse was that it was Torres. Never has such a player come from abroad and been adored like Torres had. He was supported and loved in a manner very few players are. More than Steven Gerrard. More than Jamie Carragher. Michael Owen. Xabi Alonso. Steve Mcmanaman.

Torres was loved in Liverpool. Idolized. His song was always the first to be sung, his shirt the biggest selling one in England and his goals played on loop on LFC TV

Personally, he was the only Liverpool player I’ve ever had a deep love for since I, you know, “grew up”. It seems ridiculous to say it but no game felt complete without a Torres goal. We could win 5-0 but if Torres hadn’t scored, it would gnaw at you a bit.

And, of course, his quality was so bewildering it pushed many a Red to question their sexuality.

But then, suddenly, he wanted to leave. And despite our best efforts, Torres did leave. Minutes before deadline day in fact. To Chelsea. That horrible, nouveau riche club with glory hunting fans who discovered football the minute it became fashionable.

And they lapped it up. They took the piss nonstop. We were told, daily, that we “were not famous anymore”. That we’d become a small club. That we were no longer dining at the table of the giants of European. Torres leaving to Chelsea meant Liverpool had become a smaller club than Chelsea. It was official now. And it boded very badly for the future. The fact we immediately spent a ridiculous 35m pounds on Andy Carroll didn’t make us feel better.

Of course, we’d heard all that before. Many times. But this was the first time you actually stopped and thought, “you know what, they could be right”. For the first time in the modern era, you seriously questioned where the club stood.

And as a quirk of the fixture list, the first time Torres would turn out in Blue would be 5 days after his transfer…  at Stanford Bridge… Against Liverpool.

We spent all week agonizing about this game. We’d be subjected to neverending chants about how far our club had fallen. About how our star player and adopted son thought he was too good for us. We had daily visions of Torres scoring against us, celebrating with his new teammates, rubbing our still sore wounds.

This was supposed to be the day were the coffin of Liverpool Football Club as a footballing institution was supposed to be nailed shut.

Instead it became a reminder of everything that made that football club great.

Cheered on by an unbelievably loud travelling Kop, the Reds defended stoutly, made the best chances and scored on the hour after a mix up in the Chelsea defense. Chelsea never threatened. With Lucas Leiva imperious in midfield, Torres and co never got a look in. The Spaniard was even elbowed by Daniel Agger and subbed in the second half to the jeers of the ones who once loved him so much.

When the whistle blew, there was ecstasy on the Liverpool bench and in the stands. It was 3 points but in reality it was so much more. It was a timely reminder to everyone that Liverpool Football Club was bigger than one player. That the club would not go away without a fight. That the spirit and passion of the holy trinity (comprised of the fans, manager and players) would continue to fight to make the club great again.

13 months on and Liverpool have their first trophy for 6 years.

 And Torres? Poor Torres. He’s scored 3 league goals in over a year, and his name as become synonymous with failure. Gone is the magnificent player who once wore Red and in his place is a shell of a man, frightened to shoot and labored in his movements. He can’t even get in to the Spain squad anymore.

And the nightmare for him all began on his debut for Chelsea, where his former club reminded the world that they were an empire still.

Comments

[parisien]

eventhough he was more successful in Liverpool, I think that torres made the right decision to move to a bigger club. A club where he could win the premier league title (that liverpool has not won for several years) and the champions league. For me torres is just having a bad season as each great player can have, and he will shine again very soon in Chelsea, or another great club like PSG, Real or Barca.

[mustafa]

excellent read mate..especially about the benayoun goal...almost teared up...brilliant