ROBERTO MARTÍNEZ will hold further talks with Liverpool’s owners on Tuesday as he considers whether he can work within the new management structure Fenway Sports Group wants at Anfield.
The Wigan Athletic manager met John W Henry, Liverpool’s principal owner, in Miami on Thursday for what his chairman, Dave Whelan, has described as “constructive talks”.
Whelan also claimed the 38-year-old was offered the job of succeeding Kenny Dalglish as manager but Liverpool deny any offers were made.
Henry and Tom Werner, the Liverpool chairman, will travel to England early next week to interview several candidates for the post and still wish to speak to the Swansea City manager Brendan Rodgers.
“Roberto has had a constructive meeting with Liverpool. He is now back at my home in Barbados,” revealed Whelan, who will demand around €3.75m in compensation for Martínez to join Liverpool.
“He returns to London on Tuesday, when he will have further talks with Liverpool and when a decision will be made.
“There was no other manager mentioned so I imagine they want Roberto. I don’t want to lose him, but I made him a promise when he first joined that, if a big club came in for him, I’d let him go, and I will honour that promise.”
Meanwhile, Luis Suarez has reopened the controversy surrounding his race row with Patrice Evra by revealing his conscience is “completely calm” over events at Anfield on October 15th last year and accusing the English Football Association of wanting “to get rid of a Liverpool player”.
The Uruguay forward served an eight-match suspension this year after being found guilty of racially abusing the Manchester United defender by an independent panel appointed by the FA. Suarez and Liverpool did not appeal against the decision, despite protestations from the club over the process that led to him being charged.
Suarez caused further problems for Liverpool and the then manager Kenny Dalglish when he refused to shake Evra’s hand in the return league fixture at Old Trafford in February.
That prompted a series of apologies from Liverpool, Suárez and Dalglish, but the striker has never apologised to Evra personally for what occurred at Anfield and, in an interview with Russia Today, claims he has no cause to.
“The suspension, I suppose, you could call strange and unbelievable,” said Suarez. “Without a single shred of proof, they suspended me. I accepted it without saying anything obviously because they could have made longer and it would have just made the whole thing continue, but my conscience is completely calm, and so is that of the club and my family.
“There was not a single convincing proof that I had done any of the things they accused me of doing. I am very calm about all of it. I have played all my childhood and everyone knows that in Uruguay there is a huge black population. I had team-mates and friends of both colours all the time in the national team, in Liverpool, in Holland, where the majority are from Surinam, and I never had any problem with them.
“Holland is one of the countries in the world where there is the highest number of black players and at no point was there an issue.
“Well, these are the things about football. It seems to me that they had to get rid of a Liverpool player and, well, they definitely were gratified by all of this.”
Fenway Sports Group sacked the long-serving head of communications Ian Cotton this month after a season that attracted fierce criticism of the club’s handling of the Suárez affair. The striker, however, claims his wife bore the brunt of the fallout.
