Should Liverpool persist with Luis Suarez?

Is he really worth the hassle?

I am the usual phone-is-my-friend guy who wakes up in the morning, rubbing his eyes, logs on to Facebook and scrolls through to check what’s trending.

I am a huge Liverpool fan, who hits ‘like’ on any darned page of Liverpool FC, a habit which of late has been a shade troublesome. As I wake up, I see my home page flooded with news on Suarez – he wants to leave, he feels cheated, he will hand in a transfer request and what not. A little later in the day, as I scroll through the other football news, I still find something on the Suarez saga. With all due respect, this is getting really frustrating.

Even on our legendary captain’s day – Stevie G’s testimonial – the talk was all about Luis Suarez with no mention of the legend, who has put a host of titles at stake because of his loyalty and love of the club.

Suarez has enjoyed the support of the Liverpool management and fans even in times of trouble, which only arose because of his antics. Be it the so called “racism” saga to the more recent biting incident, Liverpool fans have stood through the one they considered their hero. But what do they get in return?

I agree Suarez has been on his toes, given his all and scored a lot of goals, but considering this is the time Rodgers’ philosophy is shaping into something fruitful, the time Liverpool are trying to strengthen their team, the time they are really going to push for the top 4 and eventually the title, it would be considerably better if he stayed put.

In his latest interview, Suarez has been quoted as saying,

“I am always going to be grateful to Liverpool for everything. But 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 I could double the money they paid for me.

“I just ask that they respect the objectives I have in my career. I don’t want things to end badly. I just want us to come to an amicable agreement according to what was agreed,” Suarez told The Telegraph UK.

Suarez here comes to the defence of the accusation of him not being loyal, and wants Liverpool fans to understand his stance on forcing a move away.

There is absolutely no denying that a player’s ambitions must be paid heed to. But the one thing that still baffles is: how is a move to Arsenal a step forward and hence, an ambitious one?

Arsenal has had a host of players moving out, with just a solitary signing in young Yaya Sanogo. A team that is yet to play a qualifier to get into the Champions League next season, it hasn’t won anything for eight years and with the team as it stands, doesn’t look like winning anything soon. How is that being ambitious? Or we should wait for Arsenal to lose to PSV and then allow him to leave? I wonder how he would react then. ‘Interesting’ to say the least!

Another point to be brought in here is that earlier, Suarez wanted a move away from England because of the negative media attention and the fact that he despises them. So an intra-EPL transfer is certain to raise more than a few eyebrows.

An amusing fact is Suarez using the English media to force a move – the one thing he hated to the core and despised for so long that he wanted to just go away, is coming to his rescue.

Given all of this, there seems to me a lot more than what meets the eye in the Suarez transfer. He has been contradicting his statements time and again which has agitated the Liverpool faithful even more.

To put it in a different perspective – another staggering fact is that Suarez is on extremely low wages as compared to his Premier League counterparts. If van Persie earns 200,000/week and Suarez makes 120,000/week, then Suarez leaves for a better prospect. Is it so difficult to understand? This, to go with Champions League appearance – justified at that.

Suarez further on claims:

“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.

“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.”

“I want to move to play in the Champions League and there is a club offering me that opportunity. I have told the manager that I want to leave the club.

“I am being accused of showing a lack of loyalty but last year I had the opportunity to move to a big European club and I stayed on the understanding that if we did not qualify for the Champions League the following season then I would be allowed to go,” he went on in a chat with The Telegraph UK.