adminLIVERPOOL winger Raheem Sterling has cautioned his team-mates against relying on new signing Mario Balotelli as a like-for-like replacement for striker Luis Suarez. The Uruguayan forward left Anfield for Barcelona in a deal worth over £75 million despite the player’s stringent suspension. Suarez is sidelined by Fifa from all football until November after biting Giorgio Chiellini during Uruguay’s World Cup defeat of Italy in Natal. In an exclusive interview with weekly magazine Sport Sterling said: “Luis will be missed, obviously. With 31 (league) goals in a season, anyone would miss him. He’s a massive loss, but the manager has brought in other players to fill the void.
“I haven’t come across Mario too much, but he has the ability and the goalscoring ratio to achieve great things here. But obviously not everyone’s going to score 31 goals, so the plan is to chip in with more goals across the team.”
Sterling, who was the standout player for England on Wednesday night in the 1-0 defeat of Norway is confident Liverpool can kick on from the second-place finish achieved last season, the closest they have come to winning the top-flight title since 1990. — The Telegraph
Online Reporter