Fernando Torres The El Nino's Story
In his prime he was the most feared strikers of all time, credit to his instinct on the ball and hunger for goals, but do we really know El Nino's full history so let's take a journey down memory lane.
Born 20 March 1984 Fernando José Torres Sanz and at the age of 7, fell in love with the football but it was not a striker role he wanted to play, he started in the nets. He later moved up the field and started as a striker with an impressive scoring record, this drew the attention of Atletico Madrid.
At the age of 11 in 1995, he joined Atletico Madrid with six years down the line making his senior debut playing CD Leganes but he only registered his first goal in his second game which was played with Albacete Balompie.
He excelled at Atletico living his dream and becoming the captain at the age of 19. The last season for the club came in 2006-07 where his goal tally was 14 in La Liga he then secured his deal with Liverpool.
joining Liverpool was a big move for both parties. Torres had his work cut out for himself with big shoes to fill with those that left before him. New boy number 9 did not disappoint with a tally of 33 goals in his first season. His presence was an instant hit with Stevie G almost been on a telepathic level. Torres was a crowd favorite and instantly everyone was walking with the numbers nines name on their backs.
All that was short-lived when Chelsea came knocking to secure his services and he left for a record fee of 50 million euros. The fans did not take it well feeling betrayed and let down. The move didn't prove to be a fruitful one for Torres, he was a shadow of the man he used to be while wearing red. He did have some stand-out moments like scoring against Barcelona in the Champions League and he had his downs like missing and open net against Man United. He had is a fair share of media attention often always been overdrawn out.
Moving on to AC Milan should have been a lifeline for Torres and after spending 6 months without showing his true self he moved back to his beloved childhood club Atletico Madrid scoring 27 goals before moving to Sagan Tosu ending his career scoring 5 goals in 35 appearances in China.
I think people have different views in deciding should Torres feature as a great or a flop and in my personal opinion, I would rate him to be part of the greats that ever played the game.