Nando made his football debut for Albecete in 1993, the impressive form he showed for the Spanish minnows earned him a move to primera division side Real Zaragoza in 1995. In his first two seasons at Zaragoza, Morientes was outstanding netting 30 goals, this impressive goal tally caught the eye of Real Madrid, and in the summer of 1997 he earned a dream move to the Spanish giants.
A year later he took he made his international debut for Spain and also played in Madrid’s champions league final win against Juventus. Nando went on to be selected for the France 98 World Cup in which he scored two goals.
Two years later after more champions’ league glory at Madrid Nando surprisingly was left out of the squad for Euro 2000. Instead of letting this disappointment get to him, Nando kept performing well for Madrid and finally got the reward he craved, coming in the shape of his first La Liga title win at Madrid followed by a third champions league title in 2002. Another La Liga title followed in 2003 and despite being an integral member of the Madrid side he fell out of favour at the Bernabeu.
That summer a loan move was agreed and Morientes left for Didier Deschamps Monaco. The move to Monaco seemed to be inspired and Nando showed his best form of his career helping Monaco reach the champion’s league final only to be beaten by Porto.
As the 2004/2005 season came around the English and Spanish press were both linking Fernando with a move to Liverpool after they had acquired the managerial skills of Rafael Benitez. No move materialised that summer transfer window, but after Djibril Cisse’s season was cruelly ended at Ewood Park in October, the newspapers became rife once again with talk of Morientes making a winter transfer to Anfield. Then in late December of 2004 Nando went public with his desire to move to the Merseyside club, stating that he had even bought an English dictionary! As the January transfer window rolled around so did the news that Fernando Morientes, would be making a £6.3 million move to Liverpool.
Morientes made his Anfield debut on 15th January against Manchester United. He showed some early signs of being a very successful striker at Anfield going close on a couple of occasions on his debut. But after so long without first team football at Madrid, Morientes was never really fully fit and sharp for the rest of the 2004/2005 season and as a result of being cup tied for Liverpool’s champions league glory he struggled to regain full fitness, but did show some promise notably against Charlton and Fulham scoring on both occasions.
After a fairly barren 6 months at Liverpool, Morientes would finally get a break from action during the summer of 2005 to improve his fitness and adapt a bit more to the premiership. He also made his Liverpool champions league debut in august scoring a couple of goals. Nando has made a much improved start to the 2005/2006 Premiership season scoring against Anderlect in the champions league group stages Rafael Benitez is now convinced that the floodgates will open for Morientes.
This will be a very important season for Fernando, and one that Liverpool fans will watch closely hoping he can regain the form that made him the 2004 champions league golden boot winner.
Update: Morientes signed for Valencia for 3 million pound in July 2006 after failing to impress sufficiently during his 18 months at the club.
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