Crouch to Portsmouth

Filed in archive Transfer rumours on July 7, 2008

It would appear that Peter Crouch is on his way to Portsmouth from Liverpool. This is a wonderful signing for the South Coast club who will be looking to push on from last year's FA Cup win.

The deal is believed to be worth between nine and eleven million pounds, depending on which newspaper you read, but is definitely well short of Rafa Benitez's original valuation of the lanky front man at fifteen million.

Crouch scored eleven goals for Liverpool last season in a year when he only started nine games. His overall record at the club of forty goals in one hundred and thirty five appearances is good. Despite being unable to convince Benitez that he was worth a starting role in his side, Crouch remained a very dangerous substitute to bring on and was popular with the Liverpool faithful.

At Portsmouth, Crouch will be playing alongside his occasional England partner Jermaine Defoe. The two of them will have a great opportunity to forge an effective partnership that it will be hard for Fabio Capello to ignore when he selects his sides for the World Cup qualifiers.

The two men will provide a formidable strike-force for Premier League defences to worry about and Portsmouth could easily be challenging for a European place again.

Crouch has scored goals wherever he has been and his record of fourteen goals in twenty-eight appearances for England bears comparison to any other striker. He has been a little unlucky to be left out of things over the past few months but if this move goes ahead, he will have the perfect opportunity to show everyone just how good he is.