Luis Suarez interview: LFC Weekly magazine, issue 443
TRANSFER deadline day: the latest test of Kenny Dalglish’s managerial return. Rumours push a player in one direction before pulling him in another. The media and their cavalcade of satellite dishes have been gathering on Deysbrook Lane - the other road that intersects Liverpool’s Melwood training ground – since midnight. They wait impatiently for a story, preparing their dictaphones; click, click clicking their cameras.
At the first opportunity given to him, Dalglish - knowing this - controls the hysteria instantly. “It’s best if I go first,†he tells the newsmen that have made it inside for his weekly press conference. “I’ll tell you where we’re up to with transfers…then we’ll move on to Stoke.â€
Nobody argues with a man whose nickname is ’The King’ – for he is the statesman that embodies all that is good about Liverpool: the kind of character that made Luis Suarez realise that this was the club for him.
“He [Dalglish] is a person who you respect after only a few minutes of conversation,†Suarez told LFC Weekly in his first interview with the written media since arriving from Ajax. “He tried to speak to me in Spanish – ‘hola, bienvenido’ (hello and welcome) – the basics and that impressed me. Obviously, he is a legend at this club…in this city, but I think it’s very important to judge people as you see them rather than just what you hear. He has lived up to that legend in my eyes.â€
The changes at Anfield since Dalglish’s second appointment as Liverpool boss at the start of January have been remarkable. With a few positional tweaks to the starting XI, the team has become as united as it is fluid; they are scoring goals again and keeping clean sheets; Fernando Torres has left for Chelsea for a £50m fee; while the club has broken its own transfer record twice in one day - first for Suarez - then for Newcastle United’s Andy Carroll.
Throughout all of this, Dalglish has been a calming and authoritative figure. His manner and attitude towards football immediately impressed upon Suarez just as it has done on the majority of onlookers.
“When Liverpool first contacted Ajax, I wanted to give the club a chance to present itself to me and my family first, then allow us to gain our own impressions. I could have spoken to someone like Diego Forlan (the former Manchester United striker) who has played at Anfield and experienced the Premier League before. But in life you need to make your own opinion so I spoke to Liverpool with an open mind - even though I was immediately excited about their interest.
“I could see quickly that Dalglish is a manager and a person who I can relate to and he is very determined to make the team play with a certain image – the kind of attractive football that I want to be a part of.
“He was very keen to bring me here and if there is one person that was influential in my signing it was him. He is very ambitious about the club and is confident he can lead the club back to the top. Now I am here, I do not want to disappoint him in any way.â€
Suarez will, of course, wear Dalglish’s old number seven shirt. Although the player recognises its significance, he insists that it places no extra pressure on him to achieve success.
“Everybody has told me about the symbolic importance of the number 7 here,†he says. “First there was Keegan, then Dalglish – both fantastic players. But personally, as soon as I step out on the field, I am not bothered by the number on my back. Sentimentality has never really been very important to me – every club I’ve been at, I’ve worn a different number. My focus has always been how I can help the team win the game.â€
Suarez is happy to play in any position that his new manager deems appropriate.
“The most important thing is that I am out there…contributing,†he continues. “I am not in a situation to come here and demand that I start in a certain area of the pitch. I feel comfortable anywhere along the front line, whether it’s left, right or through the middle. I haven’t had a chance to speak to the manager about my position yet, but it is clear that he has a lot of faith in me – and that’s very important.â€
Yards away from Suarez in Melwood’s reception area stands a replica of Liverpool’s fifth European Cup, acquired in Istanbul. It rests in a glass cabinet and any newcomers unfamiliar with its presence can only stare and envisage what it would be like to one day lift it. The Uruguayan, who sampled Champions League group stage football for the first time earlier this season, is no different. After entering the small interview room, he glances through a gap in its Perspex door before taking a better look on departure ahead of a medical somewhere beyond in Melwood’s labyrinth of corridors.
“I’m very excited about the future here at Liverpool,†he says. “The club has a long and glorious history and is respected by football supporters, not just in Europe but across the whole world. Okay, the last 18 months hasn’t gone as the club or the fans would have wished but I have spoken at length with the people here and I can see that they have the passion and determination to take Liverpool back to where it should be.
“I have been in Europe for nearly five seasons now and every single season Liverpool has been challenging for the most important European competitions. I understand they haven’t won the domestic title for a long time but there is a real desire amongst the people here to make sure that doesn’t continue for too much longer. I want to be a part of that.â€
One person who won’t be a part of Liverpool’s future is Fernando Torres. Suarez was unconcerned when he was informed about the Spaniard’s desire to leave the club ahead of signing his own five-year contract.
“I signed for Liverpool because it is the biggest club in England and amongst the top five in the world,†he insists. “Liverpool is a club that isn’t just about one or two players. It is about having a team that all wants to achieve the same things. For me, there are many good players here. Steven Gerrard symbolises everything that is beautiful about Liverpool and has been consistently one of the best performers in Europe for more than a decade. Then there is Reina, Meireles, Kuyt, Johnson, Agger, Carragher and others who are well respected in European football. Fernando is also a good player who did very well here but it’s important now to focus on the future…on what we have.â€
Suarez spent most of his childhood on the modest streets of Montevideo after moving there at the age of seven from the Uruguayan-Argentinian border town of Salto more than 350 miles away. Mainly under the watch of his mother (who worked as a housekeeper), he and his four other brothers idolised Gabriel Batistuta, the Argentine centre-forward.
“He was a complete number nine,†says Suarez. “Brave, skilful – powerful. What I liked most was that he could score goals from anywhere. When I was a child and he scored for Fiorentina, I would play on the street and try to repeat what I had seen. Importantly, he was a hard worker who never had it easy. That inspired him and, in turn, has inspired me.â€
Suarez signed schoolboy forms with Nacional and progressed to the club’s first-team shortly after his 18th birthday. Within three years, he’d moved to Europe, first with Groningen in Holland‘s Eredivisie, then to Amsterdam and Ajax.
"He is unpredictable…but that makes him special too," said his former Ajax boss Marco van Basten. Under next coach Martin Jol, Suarez’s goalscoring was phenomenal: 49 strikes in 48 appearances last season, among them six hat-tricks (which included three four-goal hauls and one six-goal haul).
Soon, he was appointed club captain: “Ajax are the most historical club in Holland – everybody in Europe knows that,†Suarez says. “Few players in the past have come from abroad to be awarded the captaincy at such a young age. That alone brought great expectancy and pressure. But it also gave me a lot of pride too. I tried to captain the team in my own manner – rather than repeat what somebody else had done before...be myself.â€
The captaincy helped him mature on and off the field – something that he believes will help him settle quickly on Merseyside.
“Ajax made me realise that it’s important to keep a perspective on life and football,†he reflects. “I am aware that the fee Liverpool paid for me was big, but I’m not going to worry abut that. There will be a pressure from the outside for me to succeed but every time I set foot on to a football pitch, I want to enjoy it. There is no point being here if I don’t enjoy it. Some players can become obsessed with the pressure and trying to deal with it, but I think it is important to be yourself - try your best and believe in yourself.â€