The Torres latest: Milan move hits speedbump

With AC Milan wanting to take Fernando Torres off Chelsea's hands and Fernando Torres wanting to escape from the dystopian nightmare that is his life at Stamford Bridge, only one obstacle remains before a move can be consummated: the Blues need to find a way to get their most expensive signing to agree to ditch his contract.

Which, unsurprisingly, turns out to be fairly challenging. Torres wants a certain amount of severance pay, and Chelsea, quite reasonably, don't want to have to replace their third choice starter, buy a new one and then continue to pay the old one to lead Milan's line. At least, they don't want to pay very much. And the latest from Italy is that this is what's holding up the completion of the transfer: Di Marzio report that there's still no agreement between the Blues and their number nine, and that means this is a no-go. For now.

Chelsea have maintained that they're perfectly happy to keep Torres for depth this whole time, so they undoubtedly hold the stronger hand here -- they can just keep refusing his demands and stick with him for yet another season, which I'd imagine Torres himself would rather not have happen. Waiting it out and seeing if the asked-for severance package comes down as the window approaches is probably the correct tack, as long as Chelsea have a striker move waiting in the wings pending the Torres deal actually going through.

There's also the possibility that the club is trying to force Torres to hand in a transfer request and thereby forfeit any loyalty clauses he might get in his contract, an admittedly speculative thought but one which would make a good deal of sense in terms of saving money. We'll see what happens over the next few days.