Fernando Morientes

Fernando Morientes Sánchez (born April 5 1976 in Cilleros, Cáceres, Spain) is a football (soccer) who plays for Valencia CF. He has previously played for Liverpool F.C., AS Monaco, Albacete Balompié, Real Zaragoza and most notably Real Madrid C.F. where he played between 1997 and 2005. He was a part of the successful Real Madrid sides that won the UEFA Champions League thrice between 1998 and 2002 (runner-up in 2004 with Monaco), and the Spanish Primera Liga twice.

Club career

Early career

At the age of 17, Morientes began his top-flight career at Albacete Balompié in 1993. He spent two seasons at the club, scoring five goals in 22 appearances (9 starts and 13 substitute appearances). Morientes transferred to Real Zaragoza in 1995, where he spent two seasons. He scored goals regularly, and in his time at Zaragoza managed 30 goals in 66 appearances for the club.

Real Madrid

Morientes' performances for Zaragoza caught the eye of Spanish giants Real Madrid C.F.. He transferred to the club in the summer of 1997 for approximately €6.6 million. Morientes made 33 appearances for the club, scoring 12 goals. He formed a successful strike partnership with Raúl González. Real Madrid also won the UEFA Champions League in this season. In the 1998/99 season, he performed very well, scoring 19 goals in the league and 25 goals in 38 appearances overall. He continued to perform well in the 1999/00 season, scoring 19 goals and finishing as Real's top scorer in a year where he also helped Real to their second Champions League title in 3 seasons, scoring in the 3-0 win over Valencia CF in an all-Spanish final. In the next season, Morientes won the first of two La Liga titles with Real Madrid, scoring 10 goals overall which included four in eight appearances in the Champions League as Real lost in the semifinals to eventual winners FC Bayern Munich. He missed the tail-end of the La Liga season due to injury.

In the 2001/02 season in La Liga, Real failed to win the league, losing out to Valencia. However, Morientes continued his scoring form, scoring 18 league goals in only 25 starts, with six substitute appearances. He also scored five goals in Real's 7-0 demolition of Las Palmas, missing out on a double hattrick after missing from the spot late in the match. He finished second in the topscorers list for the season, tied with Patrick Kluivert and behind Diego Tristán. Real were successful in winning the Champions League after beating Bayer Leverkusen. Morientes played in the final and received a third Champions League winners medal.

In the summer of 2002, Real Madrid signed Brazilian superstar Ronaldo from Inter Milan. This fuelled rumours that Morientes would soon be leaving the club, with F.C. Barcelona and Tottenham Hotspureportedly interested. Barcelona were reportedly on the verge of signing Morientes for around €22 million, but the move fell through due to Barca's reluctance to match Morientes' wage demandsventually, Morientes decided to stay at Madrid, but as predicted he did not feature as much in the side after the arrival of Ronaldo, who was preferred to Morientes in the starting lineup along with Raul. Morientes also had a highly publicised spat with the then Real manager Vicente Del Bosque during a Champions League match against Borussia Dortmund in early 2003n the January transfer window, despite continuous rumours of moves to Tottenham, Real Zaragoza,A.S. Roma and A.C. Milan, Morientes remained at the club for the remainder of the season. Real would go on to win the league and Morientes earned his second La Liga medal, making a total of 15 appearances (with three starts) and scoring five goals.

It was now clear that Morientes was not part of the first team at Real Madrid. At the start of the 2003-04 season, after extensive but ultimately unsuccessful negotiations regarding a loan deal with Germany's Schalke 04, he was loaned to Ligue 1 side AS Monaco. Here, he performed very well, scoring 10 goals in 28 appearances in the league. However, it was in the Champions League that he really made an impact. Monaco reached the final of the competition, eventually losing in the final to FC Porto. Morientes finished as the top scorer, scoring nine goals. Ironically, Monaco met Real Madrid in the quarter-finals. Morientes scored a vital away goal for Monaco in the first leg, which Real Madrid won 4-2. He was applauded by the Real Madrid fans after he scored. In the second leg, he scored again as Monaco won 3-1, taking the aggregate score to 5-5. Monaco went through on away goals. He also scored in their semifinal victory over Chelsea F.C., but could not prevent Monaco from losing 0-3 in the final to Porto, played, ironically, at the Arena AufSchalke in Gelsenkirchen, Germany. Morientes' form resulted in him winning the 2004 European Striker of the Year award.

After returning to Real Madrid at the start of the 2004/05 season, Morientes' hopes of forcing his way into the Real squad were further dampened with the arrival of Michael Owen from Liverpool. It was clear that Morientes was surplus to Real's requirements. As a result, he was transferred to Liverpool F.C. in January 2005 for a fee of £6.3m, after making only 13 substitute appearances for Real in the first half of the season.

During his time at Real Madrid, Morientes made a total of 182 league appearances, with 112 starts and 70 appearances as a substitute. He scored 72 leage goals.

Liverpool

He made his debut for the club against rivals Manchester United F.C. and scored his first Liverpool goal on February 1 2005 against Charlton Athletic F.C.. He was cup-tied for Liverpool's Champions League campaign and did not feature in their victory against AC Milan in the final of the competition.

Although Morientes came to Liverpool with a very good reputation, his transfer to Merseyside was followed by a large dip in form. He scored only three goals in the 2004-05 in English football season. He was often played in a deep-lying striker's position instead of his favoured target man role, and failed to adapt to this new role, as well as the faster style of the FA Premiership. At the end of the 2005-06 season, he was sold to Valencia CF. During his time at Liverpool, he managed only 12 goals in 61 appearances, although he was part of the squad that won the 2006 FA Cup.

Valencia

Fernando Morientes joined Valencia CF for a fee of £3m in May 2006 on a three-year deal after failing to impress at Anfield. He was assigned the number 9 shirt, which he previously wore at Real Madrid, and for Spain at the 2002 FIFA World Cup.

Morientes made his debut for Valencia on 27 August, 2006 against Real Betis, and also scored the first goal of the season for Valencia. Incidentally, Valencia is the fourth club that Morientes has scored for on his league debut, after Real Madrid, Albacete and Real Zaragoza. He also scored twice on his debut for the Spanish national team, as well as scoring on his first appearance for Spain Under-21s and Real Madrid B.

In his first Champions League match for Valencia, Morientes scored a hattrick against Greek side Olympiakos. This also made him only the second player to score for four or more teams in the Champions League, after Hernán Crespo.

Morientes returned to form following his return to La Liga, forming a successful strike partnership with fellow Spaniard David Villa. As of April 23 2007, Morientes and Villa are Valencia's top scorers and have scored over 30 goals between them. Having missed Valencia's 1-1 draw with Chelsea F.C] in the first leg of the quarter-finals of the Champions League through injury, Morientes returned for the second leg and opened the scoring in the 32nd minute, but Chelsea went on to win the game 2-1. Morientes also scored against former club Real Madrid for the third time in 3 games since he left them, but Valencia would once again lose 2-1 with Sergio Ramos scoring the winning goal after Morientes had cancelled out Ruud van Nistelrooy's opener.

Valencia eventually finished fourth in La Liga. A thigh injury meant that Morientes would miss the last few matches of the season, and he was also left out of the Spanish squad for the upcoming 2008 European Football Championship qualifiers.

International career

Morientes has been a reliable performer for Spain national football team since 1998, when he scored twice in the first five minutes of his debut against Sweden national football team. As of March 25 2007, Morientes is third on the Spanish all-time topscorer's list with 27 goals in 47 appearances, behind former Real Madrid C.F. teammates Raúl González (44 goals in 102 caps) and defender Fernando Hierro (who took the majority of Spain's free kicks and penalty kicks during his international career) (29 goals in 89 caps), although his goals-to-games ratio is higher than both Raúl and Hierro.

Morientes was picked in the Spanish squad for the Football World Cup 1998 and Football World Cup 2002 Football World Cup, where he scored one and three goals respectively. In the 2002 World Cup, he had a goal wrongly disallowed in Spain's quarterfinal defeat to South Korea national football team.

He was a surprise omission at 2000 European Football Championship, but played at 2004 European Football Championship where he scored one of only two goals that Spain could manage.

Morientes played for the Spanish squad during the qualifiers for the 2006 FIFA World Cup. However, due to his poor form for Liverpool in 2005/06 (he scored only five goals), he was not chosen by Spanish national team coach Luis Aragonés in the final squad for the tournament, although he was part of a 31-man initial squad named by Aragonés.

Following his return to form after moving to Valencia, Morientes was recalled to the national side. He scored his 27th goal for Spain in a 2008 European Football Championship qualifier against Denmark national football team on 24th March, 2007.

Morientes is also one of four players who are tied as Spain's all-time top scorers in FIFA World Cup history. He has scored five goals in the two World Cups he has featured in, with two goals in 1998 and three in 2002. The other Spaniards who have scored as many goals as him are Emilio Butragueño, Raúl and Fernando Hierro