No way out: Suarez is going nowhere, insists Liverpool owner Henry despite Arsenal remaining optimistic
John W Henry is ‘unequivocal’ that Luis Suarez will be a Liverpool player next season, insisting
it would be ludicrous to sell him.
While Arsenal were on Thursday night discussing their next move —
although any increase on their £40million plus one pound bid is unlikely to be anywhere near Liverpool’s £50m valuation — Anfield owner Henry made it abundantly clear that doing business with a major Barclays Premier League rival has never been on the agenda.
And he went one step further to stress that even if Barcelona, Real Madrid or Bayern Munich come calling for Suarez,
Liverpool will not grant him a move as they would have no time to find an adequate replacement. Some will inevitably question the sense of keeping a deeply unsettled player.
Suarez has been made to train alone after showing a persistently poor attitude and the incendiary interview he gave to two newspapers on Tuesday was the last straw for Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers, who said Suarez had shown the club ‘total disrespect’.
Henry said: ‘I think that I’d say Brendan spoke on behalf of the club and said it well so I don’t think there’s anything I’d want to add to it. We are not going to sell Luis. For all the top clubs it’s extremely important to keep good players but especially Liverpool because we’re not in Europe this year and have not been in the Champions League for a while. Obviously, to sell to a rival for those positions would be ludicrous.’ When pressed if there was a certain amount of money at which Liverpool might consider doing business, Henry replied: ‘No. I think it has been resolved now. We have said “no”. We do not have time to find a suitable replacement.
‘It is a football reason. It is not finances. That’s why at this point, so late in the window with everyone who’s already moved or isn’t moving, for football reasons we can’t — and especially to Arsenal.
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However, the two clubs remain in regular contact over a move and the Gunners remain optimistic that they can reach a compromise to land the Uruguayan which will mean they don’t have to equal the British transfer record, which is currently Fernando Torres’ £50m move from Anfield to Chelsea.
Arsenal remain confident their attempts will end in success, and sources have informed Sportsmail that a breakthrough could even be made before the start of next week.
Suarez, who will not be available for selection until he has served the remaining six matches of his 10-game ban for biting Branislav Ivanovic, was trying to be more conciliatory on Thursday with an interview in the Spanish newspaper Marca, even though he stopped short of apologising.
‘I’m still defending the Liverpool shirt and I will do so until the last minute,’ Suarez was reported as saying. ‘My aim is to reach an agreement with the club in a friendly manner and I hope the clause we agreed a year ago is fulfilled. Up to now, it hasn’t been. It’s not that I want to or am desperate to leave.
‘Everyone should understand I need to play in the Champions League to keep growing as a footballer.‘Now I have the chance, I want to take it. A Champions League team is making a big effort to get me and one always wants to be where they feel comfortable.’ Liverpool do not intend reporting Arsenal to the Premier League for making an illegal approach but Henry is concerned about Arsenal knowing the details of Suarez’s contract. ‘It should have been confidential, so absolutely it does (concern me),’ he said.
‘How does a club who doesn’t have permission to speak with your player see his contract? Unfortunately it’s the way it works in football. People don’t speak about it publicly but that’s the way it’s run. It’s how things are done.’
The Suarez saga has overshadowed everything during Liverpool’s pre-season but results have been encouraging and have made Henry optimistic.
That said, he does recognise the need for the club to return to the top four, given Liverpool have struggled to lure players to Anfield this summer, most notably the Armenia midfielder Henrikh Mkhitaryan, as they cannot offer Champions League football.
‘I have high expectations,’ said Henry. ‘We had a very good second half of last season, the reports from training and the feeling within the club among the players, I think we will surprise people this year.‘This episode is not going to stop us. It can’t. It needs to be playing in Europe. It needs to be playing in the Champions League. That’s what Liverpool Football Club is about.’
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2387301/Luis-Suarez-transfer-latest-John-W-Henry-says-striker-going-nowhere.html [ 此帖被CopoeL在2013-08-09 12:24重新編輯 ]
