Barcelona’s forward Cristian Tello is reportedly considering his future at the Nou Camp and may leave the Spanish giants at the end of the season as he seeks regular first team football.
Tello had been strongly linked with a move to Anfield in the summer but the 22-year old forward opted to stay and fight for his place at Barcelona. With regards to the interest from Liverpool in the summer, Tello said, “I always wanted to stay here (Barcelona).”
“The coach has confidence in me. I’m happy and ready to play. I knew that Liverpool were interested in me, but I never thought about leaving.”
Now the Daily Star is reporting that Tello may be ready to leave Barcelona at the end of the season as he struggles to break into the current side.
“Right now I am very happy, but next year we’ll see,” he said.
“Every year I’ve felt more integrated into the team, more mature, but then every year you want to play as much and when the season ends we’ll see what suits me best.
“[I want to be] playing as much as possible but I know who I have in front of me. But hey I’m ready to play it all if needed.
“I know that I can perform at the top, but that’s the coach’s decision. He has to choose between all of his options.”
There is no doubt that Tello is a great talent but is he what we need at Liverpool? He can play across anywhere in the forward line but he is not an out and out number 9 or 10. Tello is better suited playing wide in a 4-3-3 formation. But now with Liverpool’s new 3-5-2 formation, one has to question where Tello would fit in. His best bet would be to compete with Coutinho for the number 10 role.
There are several players who have suffered at Liverpool with this new 3-5-2, mainly the wide men such as Sterling, Ibe and Moses. The width in the 3-5-2 is meant to come from the wing backs, Enrique and Johnson, so the need for wide men is really not necessary. Unless Brendan Rodgers believes that he will revert back to playing 4-3-3 at some stage then Tello may not be a priority signing for the Reds right now even though we showed great interest in him in the past. Money would be better spent reinforcing our strikers and central midfielders.