Read the unbelievable Luis Suarez interview here…
Luis Suarez has publicly begged Liverpool to let him leave the club, he told The Guardian in an exclusive interview.
The comments will surely put an end to Luis Suarez’s Liverpool career. No player can remain at a club after releasing such damming comments about their club.
Suarez has claimed that the club has broken promises they made to him last summer, where they agreed to sell him if they failed to qualify for the Champions League. They now appear to have gone back on their word, regularly telling the media that the 26-year-old Uruguayan is categorically not for sale.
In 2011, Fernando Torres released similar comments about Liverpool breaking promises, and was duly sold to Chelsea for a British record £50m days later.
“Last year I had the opportunity to move to a big European club and I stayed on the understanding that if we failed to qualify for the Champions League the following season I’d be allowed to go,” said Suarez.
“I gave absolutely everything last season but it was not enough to give us a top-four finish – now all I want is for Liverpool to honour our agreement.”
Liverpool struggled to a disappointing seventh place finished, failing to qualify for any European competition this season.
“I don’t feel betrayed [by Liverpool] but the club promised me something a year ago just as I promised them that I would stay and try everything possible to get us into the Champions League.
“They gave me their word a year ago and now I want them to honour that. And it is not just something verbal with the coach but something that is written in the contract. I’m not going to another club to hurt Liverpool,” he continued.
The issue of the contract release clause is complicated, as it was previously muted that a bid of £40m or more would mean the Reds would have to sell. Arsenal offered this amount earlier in the summer, but Liverpool claimed the clause only forced them to notify the player of the bid, and not to accept it. Suarez is unsure of this, and could take the matter to a Premier League tribunal to find out.
Fans believe that Suarez owes them loyalty for the times Liverpool have stood by him in the past two seasons. He is currently serving a ten match ban for biting Chelsea’s Branislav Ivanovic, and has previously been suspended for racially abusing Manchester United’s Patrice Evra.
The Uruguayan however, believes this is irrelevant.
“They defended me, just like I defended them on the pitch. The players have always supported me and I’m grateful for that. It’s the same with the supporters. I got a great reception at the weekend and I am grateful. I don’t think the supporters are angry – I think they understand a player when he has the ambition to triumph at the highest level.
“When you are at a club for as long as you are together you stick up for each other but that does not give the club the right to go back on their commitment.”
“I’m 26. I need to be playing in the Champions League. I waited one year and no one can say that I did not give everything possible with my team-mates last season to get us there.”
After failing to get Liverpool into the top four, despite his fantastic season, the player believes that as he enters the peak of his career, he needs to be playing in Europe’s elite competition.
Few would disagree that his talent doesn’t merit this.
“I have to put my career first. People say Liverpool deserve more from me but I have scored 50 goals in less than 100 games and now they could double the money they paid for me,” he added.
Liverpool paid Ajax £22m for the players two and a half years ago, and would now expect at least £50m for him.
“I spoke with Rodgers several times and he told me: ‘Stay another season, and you have my word if we don’t make it then I will personally make sure that you can leave.'”
“Liverpool is a club with a reputation for doing things the right way. I just want them to abide by the promises made last season. Some of [my team-mates] say to me: ‘We cannot understand that if you have it signed that you can’t leave.'”
“I feel I have done enough to be playing in the Champions League at this stage of my career,” he says. “Now there is an option for me to do that and I want very much to take it. I went a long time at Ajax without playing many games in the Champions League. I am ambitious, I want to be there.”
Such extensive comments to English media will seem ironic, as Suarez publicly declared his distaste for it earlier this summer. He is clearly prepared to do anything to leave Anfield.
Suarez has stayed at home for Liverpool’s pre-season friendly trip to Oslo to face Valerenga, and will surely not represent the club again.
Arsenal are likely to come in with an improved offer, or Real Madrid could be tempted into bidding for the player should they miss out on Tottenham’s Gareth Bale.
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