If Arsenal want to win the Champions League, they will first have to silence a man generating a volcanic level of noise in the Iberian Peninsula.
Sporting Lisbon may look the easiest possible quarter-final opponents on paper but they have in their ranks a man who can’t stop scoring: a certain Luis Suarez.
No, not the biter. This one is 28, Colombian, and has 33 goals to his name this season across all competitions. That’s the same as Erling Haaland.
Most of those are in a weaker league, granted, but he’s already proven he can spear European heavyweights. In January he struck twice to sink Paris Saint-Germain. ‘Football is s***,’ declared PSG boss Luis Enrique after Suarez’s 90th-minute winner.
There is a real chance of Suarez knocking Arsenal out. It’s not the most probable eventuality, but don’t write his Portuguese team off. This is, after all, a side which has beaten PSG, Manchester City, Tottenham, and even Arsenal themselves in recent seasons – Sporting beat them on penalties in the Europa League last 16 in 2023.
Suarez joined Sporting in the summer as a £23.5million replacement for Viktor Gyokeres, having banged in 31 goals for Spanish second division side Almeria last season. Fans were initially underwhelmed at the purchase. They’re not now.
Sporting Lisbon striker Luis Suarez has scored 33 goals in all competitions – and now he has Arsenal in his sights
As one website, Portugoal.net, puts it: ‘Luis Suarez is eating the league alive’.
Many observers see him as similar to Gyokeres. The jury is still out in England as to whether that means he’s formidable or a flop, but Gyokeres now has 16 goals for the Gunners, hardly a pittance.
‘He has a very good shooting ability, with both his right and left foot,’ says Sebastiao Macias, who has worked with Suarez for the Colombian national team.
He added to Renascenca: ‘He’s a forward who doesn’t ask permission to shoot.
‘Furthermore, he’s a very aggressive player, quite direct, not afraid to take on defenders one-on-one, versatile, good at linking up play between the lines and working in depth.
‘In terms of style, he seems like an identical player to Gyokeres. The aerial game isn’t comparable, but in terms of style, attacking play, aggression, always looking to shoot with his right or left foot, finishing actions, it’s similar.
‘I think Luis Suarez is a bit more involved in the game, works more between the lines and is able to build up play more than Gyokeres.’
Standing at 6ft 1in and with pace to burn, he will not be daunted by the physical challenge presented by Arsenal’s backline.
Suarez is used to fighting, after all. It has been a long road to get to the elite level and not always plain sailing. The forward, who has a tattoo of a lion on his arm as he identifies with the big cats’ fierceness, has largely forged his career in the lower divisions of Colombia and Spain.
He was actually on the books of Watford between 2017 and 2020, but never played a competitive game for them. Sources at the club recall a character who quite frankly did not want to be there.
Sporting beat Bodo/Glimt to reach the Champions League quarter-finals (pictured) and Suarez struck twice against Paris Saint-Germain earlier this season
After a successful loan at Real Zaragoza in 2019-20, during which he scored 19 goals in the Spanish second division, he earned a £10million move to La Liga side Granada, but he was unable to translate his fine record to that level.
Marseille took a punt on him in 2022-23, but despite scoring three times in seven outings, manager Igor Tudor never fully trusted him and he was loaned out to Almeria, who gladly snapped him up permanently in the summer of 2023.
Even here he encountered grave difficulties. In 2023, Suarez fractured the fibula in his left leg and descended into a bout of depression.
‘I couldn’t even get out of bed,’ he told El Espectador, via AS. ‘I went through a depression that I gradually overcame with work and therapy.
‘That injury hit rock bottom, but it also helped me strengthen my mind. If I hadn’t experienced those moments, I wouldn’t be the player I am today.
‘Today I enjoy the game more, I’m making the most of it. Before, I only thought about running or scoring goals, now I understand that it’s about enjoying what you do.’
Suarez’s feats have helped him break into the Colombian national team, allowing him to fulfil a promise he made to his grandfather of representing them.
He has struck four times in 10 games for them but, rather bizarrely, all of those goals came in one World Cup qualifying match against Venezuela last year.
Rather eerily, only one other man has ever scored four goals in a South American World Cup qualifying match: Luis Suarez of Uruguay, back in 2011. Football’s invisible forces work in strange ways.
It feels likely that Suarez will have some high-profile suitors this summer, though Sporting’s £70million release clause, attached to a contract which runs until 2030, is prohibitive to all but a few elite clubs.
The striker, who has overcome injuries and depression, is said to be ‘eating the Portuguese league alive’
Any pursuit for the 28-year-old would, however, be laced with ethical complications.
The striker was arrested in December 2024 after allegations of physical and psychological violence by his ex-wife, said to have taken place between 2020 and 2023. Suarez denied the charges and the pair reached an agreement at a domestic violence court in Granada, according to reports in Spain.
The fact he is turning 29 in December may count against him, as might Gyokeres’ struggles to adapt after joining Arsenal from the same club.
But there is little doubt that Suarez is in the form of his life and that he feels ready to conquer.
‘I’ve reached the peak of my career,’ he said in the summer. ‘I want to help the team by scoring goals, providing assists, winning games, winning trophies. That’s what missing in my career: winning big trophies. I believe we can win a lot at Sporting.’
Mikel Arteta will be working hard to plan exactly how to keep him silent.
