Torres leaves Anfield in the blues

Fernando Torres' eleventh-hour switch from Liverpool to Chelsea on Monday night goes down in history as the fifth most expensive transfer in soccer history. In more immediate terms, the departure of the Spain international striker to a direct Premier League rival has left a sour taste in the mouth of the supporters that idolized Torres during his three-and-a-half year spell at the club - a disenchantment that will find a collective and unforgiving voice on Sunday when Chelsea hosts Liverpool at Stamford Bridge.

Torres, who scored a mightily impressive 81 goals in 142 matches for an increasingly weak Liverpool team, had been railing against his former employers for some time over what he perceived as a lack of ambition of its own in the transfer market. Liverpool smashed its own cash record to lure the striker from Atlético Madrid in 2007, with the presence at the helm of fellow Spaniard Rafa Benítez a major factor in his arrival. Benítez was sacked by Liverpool on June 3, 2010 precipitating a chain of events that did little to restore Torres' faith in the club's trajectory.

"My target as a player is to play for one of the top teams in the world"

Roy Hodgson replaced Benítez after guiding lowly Fulham to last year's Europa League final. But it wasn't long before Liverpool was missing Benítez, who had led it to two Champions League finals (one won and the other lost, both against AC Milan) and a second-placed league finish in 2009.

Hodgson, whose appointment gained the public backing of his new players - the soccer equivalent of a vote of an auto da fé - oversaw Liverpool's worst start to a season since before World War II and hardly bucked spirits by admitting that Liverpool faced a potential relegation battle. Torres, it transpired on Tuesday, carried out his own Spanish inquisition before Hodgson was finally sacked last month.

"Since last summer I had felt that I needed to take a forward step in my career and also for my ambition as a footballer," he said after the transfer was made official. "My target as a player is to play for one of the top teams in the world. I'm sure I'm taking a big step forward in my career by joining a club like Chelsea. I just want to be at the level where I'm supposed to stay."

Refreshing candidness, or a petulant parting shot? Torres has been in England long enough to be aware of the effect those words would have on Merseyside. Liverpool is a club that values loyalty more highly than most and in one breath Torres undid 81 goals' worth of goodwill. Shirts bearing his name were burned in the street after his acrimonious departure.

Neither will keen observers of Torres' trajectory forget that he turned down the chance to join Chelsea in 2006. Nor that he seemed open to a move to Barcelona when Samuel Eto'o was stalling on a new contract: "It would be a pleasure to play with [Lionel] Messi." Nor should Liverpool supporters be overly surprised that a player who left his boyhood club, Atlético, in order to win trophies, and won none whatsoever at Liverpool, should seek the opportunity to do elsewhere.

Torres, though, might have erred spectacularly in his choice of club as much as in his choice of words. Chelsea is not a young side and Torres has been bought as much as a statement of renewed intent by Roman Abravomich as to give the club a new talisman to build a team around. Didier Drogba will be 33 next month. Frank Lampard, John Terry and Nicolas Anelka - the players Torres identified as those he wants to play alongside - are all over 30. Chelsea is 10 points behind Manchester United in the Premiership race and has never won the Champions League: this current squad's final tilt together at that accolade could be this season. Carlo Ancelotti's team won the double last season but is in decline, by its own exacting standards, wining just two league games out of 11 between November 7 and January 5.

Could history repeat itself? Torres left the Spanish capital amid tears for Liverpool, in pursuit of titles and promising to return one day to his alma mater; Atlético won the Europa League last season and reached the King's Cup final for the first time in a decade. In any case, Torres would probably be welcomed back to Madrid with open arms. Having said "it is destiny" for him to score against Liverpool on Sunday, it is safe to assume he has left few friends at Anfield.