http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league/exclusive-fernando-torres-interview-i-can-make-chelsea-manager-jose-mourinho-think-im-the-best-option-for-him-9239818.html

 

Fernando Torres interview: ‘I can make Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho think I’m the best option for him’

 

I think, it's a bit late for that.

He looked well grumpy when celebrating Willian's goal. Jealous much?

Anyone got a gif of it?

There isn't a chance Torres will be here next season. Mourinho is just buttering him up because he knows we need to win every game in the league and turn it around against PSG and Eto'o is unlikely to feature much due to injury. I hope when he leaves and that's a certainty he will go on record and thank Chelsea fans who have supported him despite knowing deep down he was a waste of money.

He looked well grumpy when celebrating Willian's goal. Jealous much?

Anyone got a gif of it?

First player to go up and congratulate him though.

He was cuting his usual frustrated figure late on when the acceptance sinks in that he won't be scoring.

I just feel incredibly frustrated as he obviously is, realising you cannot play/recreate your past powers of playing, He has only looked any good under FSW, and that leads me to think, Chelseas style, especially this year is not suiting him, let him go back to his spiritual home....

I just feel incredibly frustrated as he obviously is, realising you cannot play/recreate your past powers of playing, He has only looked any good under FSW, and that leads me to think, Chelseas style, especially this year is not suiting him, let him go back to his spiritual home....

You've obviously blanked out (as most of us have) that he played under the FSW last season and managed 6 months without a goal in the Prem, while all the media were claiming that the FSW had 'got him scoring again'.

I just feel incredibly frustrated as he obviously is, realising you cannot play/recreate your past powers of playing, He has only looked any good under FSW, and that leads me to think, Chelseas style, especially this year is not suiting him, let him go back to his spiritual home....

i think the 'style of play' argument has long gone. he has been here long enough to adapt, and we have thrown money on playmakers to help him score. and style of play doesnt explain the fact that even when he gets goalscoring opportunities, he regularly fails to score. the club could not have done much more to help torres to find some form over the last few years, but he's clearly not up to it

Let's not delude ourselves, playing upfront for Chelsea is not easy. Our opponents defend deep and our midfielders crowd the box. We need better strikers but we also need to play to their strengths and a tactical rethink may be required. However I'm sure this will get sorted and when it does, we can look to many fruitful years.

Like others, Torres has never been up to the job and it's in everyone's best interests to end this as soon as possible.

Playing up top in any club in the Prem who are favorites is not easy but Fernando Torres makes it look imposibru. 

 

I'm sure when we get a consistent goal scorer people will quickly forget about how difficult it is to score at Chelsea. We are no where near as bad as many clubs in the Prem in terms of setting up chances. The problem is that our strikers are not usually in goal scoring positions - specially Torres and Ba; I'm sure there have been many comments from myself and other posters about this. I maintain that Torres has ALWAYS been poor in selecting his movement inside the box - even at Liverpool out of all his goals possibly a maximum of ten were simple tap ins. He usually either stands around the penalty spot or he is in no position to receive the ball; not making a run; flat footed behind a defender and expecting the ball to somehow end up in his feet. 

 

When you have someone making the correct movement you will see how easily we would create chances. Last season against West Brom is a good example - we barely had any chances in the first 60 minutes; Torres gets taken off and suddenly due to having a striker with good movement we created 3-4 clear cut chances. 

Edited April 6, 201412 yr by Las7

More intelligent runs and less of this persistent standing with your back to goal. We don't have a replacement Drogba and most of the potential replacements I read about don't play that way either.

Clever direct football never hurt any team

Edited April 6, 201412 yr by Tambling Dice

I think his frame of mind was perfectly summed up yesterday when Lamps penalty was initially saved and he showed zero desire to follow in on the rebound. Branno was closer to the ball than he was.

 

His desire/instinct to get a goal just isn't there.

You hear old pros talk about the footballing brain is still there but the body can't keep up anymore. With Torres is seems the other way around. He has lost along the way how to be a top class striker.

You hear old pros talk about the footballing brain is still there but the body can't keep up anymore. With Torres is seems the other way around. He has lost along the way how to be a top class striker.

 

I think that's hitting the nail on the head. The curious case of Fernando Torres.

You've obviously blanked out (as most of us have) that he played under the FSW last season and managed 6 months without a goal in the Prem, while all the media were claiming that the FSW had 'got him scoring again'.

Only reason he was scoring is because we were in the Europa League playing against semi-professional players.

Torres owes us loyal fans two things before he goes the winning goal against PSG and the one that finishes off the dippers title chances when we go to Anfield.

Torres owes us loyal fans two things before he goes the winning goal against PSG and the one that finishes off the dippers title chances when we go to Anfield.

if he starts either of those games then it signals a final nail in the coffin for our chances in those comps

If he did somehow accidentally score a goal at Anfield that cost them the title, all would be forgiven in my eyes.

If he did somehow accidentally score a goal at Anfield that cost them the title, all would be forgiven in my eyes.

 

I hope he is standing in livepool's box, a cross hits him on the arse, rebounds into Gerrard's face and into the net as the winning goal. My dream scenario 

There is a moment in my conversation with Fernando Torres when he stops and goes right back to the start of his career, to when he was a teenager at Atletico Madrid, and recalls what it was like to be looking in from the outside at the high-stakes world of elite football, and all its imponderables.

He remembers the summer of 1998 when the Italian striker Christian Vieri left the club for Lazio having been La Liga’s top goalscorer in his one season there. Torres was just 14 at the time and was “watching Atletico from the stands” right up to the moment he made his debut three years later. He was bemused by Vieri’s decision to leave.

“I didn’t realise how my life was changing,” he says. “When I was 17, 18, 20, I didn’t realise how big football was and everything around football. How many people live for football and love football. I was a professional but I was a supporter. When I was 14 years old and when Christian Vieri left I didn’t understand why the players were leaving! Then through the years you understand more things and you have to be more careful when you do things.”

Since then he has made his own big moves, from Atletico to Liverpool and on to Chelsea, the £50m transfer in January 2011 that made him the most expensive footballer in British history. Torres’ story remains one of the most intriguing in English football, the man who was once arguably the deadliest striker on the planet with 81 goals in 143 games for Liverpool who has never been able to recreate that level of form at Chelsea.

Torres does not do a lot of interviews but he has made an exception in this case and he faces the issues in his own career in unblinking fashion in a small meeting room at Cobham, having come straight from the training-ground pitch with the muddy shins to prove it. He is a thoughtful, contemplative type who weighs his answers carefully and does not dodge the difficult questions.

It has not been a good week at Chelsea. Two defeats, to Crystal Palace on Saturday and then 3-1 away to Paris Saint-Germain on Wednesday, in which Torres was a second-half substitute with André Schürrle picked ahead of him. Afterwards, Jose Mourinho was critical of his strikers. Asked whether he would have beaten PSG had he had their forwards at his disposal, the Chelsea manager replied, “Of course.”

With Samuel Eto’o still injured it will be instructive to see who Mourinho picks to lead the line against Stoke City today. In a season interrupted by injury, Torres has scored eight goals, four of them in the Premier League. In the past, most notably at the end of the 2011-12 season, he has declared himself unhappy with any demotion from first-team action but not, he says, under Mourinho.

“He [Mourinho] has to choose the one [striker] he thinks is better and try to manage the situation with the players,” Torres says. “He didn’t do anything special with me. Just treats me like one more. He puts me on the pitch when he thinks I am the best option and on the bench when he thinks I am not the best option.

“My aim is to try to make him feel I am always the best option for him. You have to have ways to adapt to this situation. Blame the manager? Blame your team-mates? Blame everyone? Or ask from yourself a bit more. I think I can do better. I can make Jose think I am the best option. That is what I have to do every day in training, all the matches. I just ask of myself the responsibility.

“The things you cannot change you can’t waste your time on. I cannot [automatically] change the way the manager thinks so I have to ask myself and be critical with myself to try to understand what he wants. I have to put more and more effort into these things. It is what I have been doing all my life … I cannot change the others so I have to be critical of myself.

“You have to prove yourself every day. You have to live for today. Three years ago? Five years ago? It’s today. If the manager thinks there is another player better than you he is going to play and this is the way. You have to try to improve and keep fighting and try to change the manager’s mind. Hopefully one day Jose can say ‘This [Torres] is my striker, he is going to be my striker’ like he does with some of the players who have won the appreciation from him.”

It is a strikingly humble approach from the man who has won a World Cup, two European Championships, a Champions League, Europa League and the FA Cup since he came to England in 2007. Watching him play, it can be difficult to read the emotions of Torres through that glassy-eyed stare maintained in triumph and calamity, but once he starts talking he is a fascinating subject.

Does he feel that, given what he has won, and having only just turned 30 last month, there is insufficient appreciation of his achievements? “I am sure people appreciate [me] … this is what I feel from people outside and from the supporters. Everything I have done in my career I have done from my values and doing things the way I like to do. So winning doesn’t matter the world for me... it’s worth it if you feel you fought for it and you have failed [along the way].

“This is the way to win, not everything is nice and you are the best in the world every day and you score five goals every game. Life is not like this. There are ups and downs and you have to go through all these things to appreciate when you win, this is a really good win.

“I feel I have had ups and downs and moments when I didn’t want to go to training or moments I really wanted to go to training because the final was coming. We started last pre-season in America 10 months ago and now we are here and all this way there have been a lot of different feelings and emotions.”

Last season was his best at Chelsea with 23 goals in all competitions, and a renewal of his partnership with his former Liverpool manager Rafa Benitez, the interim coach. Torres said he understood “what we wanted from the beginning”. This season he says he has struggled more in the games where teams have sought to deny Chelsea space but that under Mourinho they are improving all the time on how to cope with the proverbial parked bus.

In fact, it is on his role in the team and how life has changed for him that Torres is at his most erudite and illuminating. I began by asking him whether the knee operation in April 2010, which prevented him from hitting the last World Cup finals at full tilt, had been the career-changing episode – less explosive pace and power – that so many have assumed it to be.

“Who knows? You are never going to have that answer. It was not that bad an injury. It gave me a few problems after that but it is not a massive one like [his Chelsea team-mate] Marco van Ginkel [cruciate ligament] … it was one month, two month, not too bad. But the World Cup was there. At the end I was in the team that won the World Cup. There is not the point that you can say after that [it changed] … it’s not like this. Many, many things [happened]. Injuries always give you some extra problems in the future.

“You say people are always talking about fitness. Fitness is important but the most important thing is how you adapt and the way you feel physically. To adapt to a new position. To try to change your game.”

Had he had to do that? “You adapt to the way the team plays. Chelsea is not an easy team to play for because you have great players and you have to be really, really aware of the small things. The teams that come to play us go very low [deep] so the space is not there. Willian and Oscar are very mobile and quick.

Fernando Torres of Chelsea has been on the receiving end of some criticism from his manager Fernando Torres of Chelsea has been on the receiving end of some criticism from his manager (Getty Images)

“When you have more space, for us it is better but also it is because the other team is better and we have to be more compact, against the big teams like Manchester City, Liverpool, Bayern Munich in the Super Cup. It is not easy. The Premier League is very difficult football and very different to when you play in Europe but the player has to have experience to adapt and this is the key point.

“To change the manager quite often is not the best thing because you don’t have the stability but even doing this we won the Champions League, Europa League and FA Cup in the last two seasons, changing the manager many times. In football you cannot say: ‘These are the way things are going to be.’ Doing what is not supposed to be the right thing we won the Champions League, the most important trophy at club level. I don’t know. Everyday I think I understand less!”

We go back to the subject of Torres having to change his game as he gets older, like, for example, Alan Shearer, the Premier League’s all-time leading goalscorer. “Shearer is a clear example,” Torres says. “He adapted his game to what is better for him and he did great, always. It is not easy for a footballer to understand. You have to change because when things are not [going] well you normally think ‘I have to go back to basics, the things I have been doing’. But sometimes you have to change because the way you are playing.

“You adapt to the way your team is playing. It is what I am doing now. Atletico played one system. Spanish football is completely different. I came to England – completely different football – and I adapted very quickly because the Liverpool team with Benitez we played compact and so quick and it was easier for me. The national team and Chelsea are similar. We play with a lot of quality, we keep the ball, we pass the ball a lot of times.”

What is Torres’ future? There can be no doubt that Mourinho will buy a new striker in the summer with the preferred choice the Atletico striker Diego Costa, Brazilian-born but now a Spanish citizen who has also taken Torres’ place in the Spain squad.

“In the last month I have moved to Atletico, Valencia, Inter and Monaco,” Torres says with a smile, in reference to the stories written about him. “I have two more years left on my contract and I said on the first day that I have signed five years with Chelsea and I want to play five years with Chelsea. I have tried to win everything with this club and hopefully the Premier League is the next one. If we win the Premier League we have the chance to play the Community Shield, that’s another one we don’t have.[b/]

“We have to fight to win another Champions League and we have the chance to win the Super Cup, the Club World Cup. There are many things still to do and hopefully two years is enough. Who knows if after that more years are coming?”

There is no doubting he does want to complete the set, Community Shield and League Cup included. At the moment he faces the more pressing problem of whether he will be included in the Spain squad for the World Cup this summer having been part of the last three successful tournament campaigns. It would, I suggest, be a shame to miss out.

“It would be for me,” Torres deadpans back. “Of course I can make it. Football is about the last month and a half and that is going to be very important. I want to be there. I love to play for my country and I have been lucky enough to be in two Euros and a World Cup. We made history. No one did it before, three in a row, and we want to do the fourth. It would be amazing for this generation. So I would like to be there, but if I want to be there I have to do well for Chelsea. Score goals and win trophies.”

It is interesting to hear him talk about Costa without a hint of bitterness. “I read an interview where he [Costa] said Spain gave him everything,” Torres says. “He moved from Brazil to Portugal when he was very young and after Atletico signed him he has been on loan everywhere in Spain. So I understand what he was trying to explain. He felt Spain gave him everything in football.

“He came from Brazil and loved Brazil. But in football he felt he had something to give back to Spain and it’s great to have him. He’s had a brilliant season and I am sure he will be important for Spain in the World Cup. A great player playing for us – and not for Brazil.”

Others might have been less generous about a player switching nationality to take their place, but Torres is nothing if not gracious. He talks fondly of the Liverpool supporters who give him merciless stick in the stadium but are different “when they see me on the street or in the letters they send me”. Hope seems to spring eternal for him, whatever the challenge. He believes he will reclaim his place for Chelsea and for Spain, and staying positive, surely, is half the battle.

Fernando Torres was speaking as part of the adidas “Forever Blue” campaign to launch the new Chelsea FC 2014-15 home kit. To pre-order your new kit visit www.chelsea.com/foreverblue and join the conversation at @adidasuk #allincfc

My other life: rock music

I am a rock man: Nirvana, Foo Fighters, Red Hot Chili Peppers (below). My brother Israel is seven years older than me and when I was a kid we shared a room. So I had no choice but to listen to the music he liked. I grew up with music from my brother in my ears. I saw the Chili Peppers at the O2 Arena and I’m waiting for the Foo Fighters to come.

I am a big fan of the Gallagher brothers. At Liverpool they came a few times, they are friends of Steven Gerrard. It was nice to meet them. When I was in Spain I couldn’t speak English so I couldn’t understand the lyrics. When I came to England I started studying music and trying to understand what my favourite songs said.

Read into it what you will:

@ChelseaActivity: Received a big nudge today from security guy at a private primary school in Surrey where Torres’ children go. Will be leaving. #CFC #Chelsea

I'm so happy, I'll *finally* be able to close this thread.

That's a twitter rumour if ever I saw it Gem! That tweet is as credible as this

@billybullsh*tter: "The lollypop man just told me Torres says that he wont have to take his pesky kids across for much longer"

I'm desperate Zola, this thread needs to go!! I'll believe anything at the moment!!! That account is pretty solid though, don't think it's randomly made up by the owner, probably something they've heard.

I wouldn't get too excited, hes gonna run that contract down to the last day - no one will pay him anything close to what he's getting here. He will dig his heels in for sure.

“In the last month I have moved to Atletico, Valencia, Inter and Monaco,” Torres says with a smile, in reference to the stories written about him. “I have two more years left on my contract and I said on the first day that I have signed five years with Chelsea and I want to play five years with Chelsea. I have tried to win everything with this club and hopefully the Premier League is the next one. If we win the Premier League we have the chance to play the Community Shield, that’s another one we don’t have.

I think he will be loaned out for the next two years like Sheva, Crespo and Veron all were.

You hear old pros talk about the footballing brain is still there but the body can't keep up anymore. With Torres is seems the other way around. He has lost along the way how to be a top class striker.

 

I think it's even more related to someone like Eto'o, who's very intelligent striker, but can't physically last all season as a regular starter at the top level anymore. Samuel Eto'o of five years ago would have easily won us the league with the same team we have now.

 

Torres, on the other hand, strikes me as someone, who forgot how to play football.

Edited April 7, 201412 yr by abramovich