Ferran Torres: the striker Spain loves to criticise

Ferran Torres: the goalscorer nobody forgives for a mistake

When PSG were losing 2-0 and rescued a draw with a goal from Ferran Torres, the Spanish striker found himself at the centre of the storm again. Not because of the goal, but because of the criticism that has dogged him for years. Some defend him with numbers: a goal every 125 minutes over the last two or three seasons, in other words, one every 1.33 games. Others see him as the missing link between Sarracena and Julio Salinas: strikers who are never forgiven for a single miss.

The perfect striker on paper

The paradox is obvious. He scored the goal that won the World Cup for Spain, and yet people remember his misses against Cape Verde and Uruguay more. The demands placed on Spain's number 9 seem inversely proportional to his performance. Those who attack him lean on the attitude argument: at 18, at Valencia, he insisted that the club's owner be present when he signed his contract. Nothing like the generation of Iniestas and Xavis, humble to the point of behaving like supermarket shelf-stackers.

The salary that lit the fuse

At Barcelona he earned 10 million gross. At PSG, 17. The net difference is even bigger because of taxation: from 5 to 9.5 million. Barça could not double his salary to match the Paris offer, especially when he was not an undisputed starter. And that leads to another reading: Barcelona's sports press, when a player refuses to take a pay cut, runs a smear campaign against him. With these figures, you would expect the debate to be settled. It rages on.