talkSPORT's man with his finger on the pulse of Spanish football, Lee Roden, gives you the lowdown on Liverpool's chances of signing Martin Montoya...
Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers has long been known as an admirer of Barcelona's young talents.
Players like Cristian Tello and Isaac Cuenca have been sporadically linked with the Reds since the first day the Northern Irishman picked up the reins at Anfield, and over the last year they have been joined by Martin Montoya.
The 22-year-old right-back is one of the most highly-rated young defenders in Spain and, while in the past it would have seemed ludicrous to suggests that the Catalans could allow him to leave and seek his fortunes elsewhere, recent events suggest that could yet be possible. In fact, Liverpool may even be quietly optimistic about landing him.
Montoya has been in the spotlight for several years now, making his Barcelona first team debut in 2011, and receiving his first senior Spain call-up that same year. After putting in an admirable performance in the absence of Dani Alves in the 2012 Copa del Rey final, Pep Guardiola's last trophy win as Barcelona coach, big things were expected to arrive pretty quickly for the young right back, who had waited patiently in the wings until then.
A string of excellent performances at the start of the 2012-13 La Liga season suggested his moment had arrived, but gradually, Tito Vilanova opted for the experience of Alves over the Spaniard, and was even reluctant to play him in meaningless end of season games that would normally be deemed an ideal opportunity for a player of his promise to gain experience.
In the months since, Montoya's confidence in Barcelona has eroded to the degree that there are doubts over whether he will sign a new deal with the club, and reports claim that he is largely maintaining an indifferent stance towards signing a new contract.
With his current deal running out in the summer of 2014, the right-back will be free to negotiate with new clubs in January, and given the lack of opportunities handed to him in recent months, it is easy to see why a player of his quality is considering pastures new, particularly after he rejected moves to both Inter Milan and Bayer Leverkusen in a gesture of faith towards his current club last summer.
In the past, the prospect of Barcelona allowing a talent like Montoya to slip from beneath their noses due to poor man management would be unthinkable, but under current president Sandro Rosell, it is beginning to look like a more common occurrence.
Thiago Alcantara, the most talented player of his generation at the Barcelona academy, was recently allowed to leave for Bayern Munich after Barcelona failed to provide him with the required game time that would prevent an unbelievably low buy-out clause from coming into effect.
More recently, forward Cristian Tello, who has suffered since the arrival of Neymar at the club, has made some ambiguous statements to suggest that he would be willing to leave the Camp Nou should his development stall.
Clearly, there are now doubts being sewn among Barcelona's youngsters, with uncertainty over whether they will be given the chance to succeed at the club during a crucial stage of their careers. The number of teams queuing up to provide those players with their opportunities could virtually fill the 11km long Avinguda Diagonal that the Camp Nou nestles beneath.
Liverpool will be quietly optimistic about their chances of landing Montoya, therefore. The months before Christmas will be key, as Barcelona are expected to up their efforts to tie the defender down to a new deal before then.
As a quirk of fate, injuries in the back four mean he is likely to start only his second game of the season this weekend against Osasuna, but with Real Madrid on the horizon and Dani Alves only receiving a rare rest rather than missing out through injury, it is likely to be only a mere blip on a largely unhappy beginning to the season for Montoya.
If nothing significant changes regarding his playing time before the stroke of New Year, and indeed, Montoya fails to enter into contract negotiations in the meantime, it can be seen as a signal of intent on his behalf, and it will be up to the Reds to convince him that Anfield is the pick of the bunch from the multiple offers he will undoubtedly receive.
Source: talkSPORT
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