As you’ll be aware, Manchester City completed the signing of Ferran Torres from Valencia earlier this month.
The move hasn’t gone down particularly well with Valencia fans, who, while angered at the club for selling a star of the future at a reduced cost, aren’t happy with him going in general.
Their rage was not lessened by an interview the new Manchester City man conducted with Marca following the completion of his move, where he criticised the Spanish club and accusing them of trying to ruin his name.
However, unlike many of his colleagues, who wrote articles echoing the feeling of the masses, Super Deporte journalist César Izquierdo has gone out of his way to defend the youngster.
He starts by explaining that in football media, there is always a determination to find a ‘great headline’, but at the same time journalists do not want to listen to arguments that ‘contradict our version of events’.
Therefore arguments that the player saying he is thankful to the fans are ‘fake’ is nonsense as he’d be labelled ungrateful if he didn’t. Likewise, it’s nonsense to call him ‘arrogant’ for stating his desire to win things.
It’s not like the comments have caused any kind of stir at Manchester City either. In fact, they couldn’t be less bothered.
They know the type of player they’re getting after doing detailed research into his personality and life off the pitch before making their move.
In fact, Izquierdo even defends the player, saying that there has been a real ‘non-image’ about the player, created to try and tarnish his reputation.
He argues Torres didn’t ask for ‘madness’ from Valencia to stay at the club and the reality is he only requested things ‘all footballers want’.
Indeed, he points out some of the criticism aimed at him, particularly those who called for ‘commitment’, is strange as they would not have asked the same of other players.
All in all, it’s a nice change of tone from the Super Deporte journalist, who rather than slating Torres for presumably easy clicks, has gone out of his way to defend him.
How many Valencia fans will take that on board, however, remains to be seen.
