Even though he’s generally considered to be one of the best strikers in the world, Fernando Torres of Spain may find himself on the bench in the Spain World Cup semi final game against Germany in Durban on July 7. Spanish manager Vicente del Bosque said Torres offers the team a lot of effort and personality even when he’s not scoring and he has full confidence in him, but that doesn’t mean he’s entitled to start.

Torres has had no luck at all during the tournament so far as he’s gone scoreless in five games and hasn’t really looked very threatening at all despite starting in four of them. The 26-year-old striker, who plays for Liverpool in the English Premier League, had knee surgery in April and hasn’t score a competitive international goal since hitting the net in the Confederations Cup in South Africa last summer.

Del Bosque took Torres off in the 1-0 quarterfinal win over Paraguay and replaced him with midfielder Cesc Fabregas in the 56th minute. He then put forward Pedro Rodriguez on the pitch later in the game. It’s possible that Fabregas could start the game against Germany as Spain might go with a five-man midfield with striker David Villa up front on his own. Villa leads the World Cup golden boot race at the moment with five goals.

However, Del Bosque hasn’t made up his mind yet, at least not publicly anyway, and said even if he doesn’t start with a five-man midfield, it might be something he switches to during the game. While Torres role is up in the air, Villa will definitely be starting the game unless he gets injured between now and game time. He might be the lone front man, or Del Bosque could start striker Fernando Llorente to play with him. Another option is using midfielder David Silva in the attack, but he’s spent most of the tournament on the bench so far.

Del Bosque said there’s a lot of competition in the squad when it comes to attackers, but everybody has one common goal and that’s to win the World Cup for the first time in the country’s history.

The other semi-final is being played on Tuesday, that is the the match between Uruguay and Netherlands, and Spain will meet one of them for sure, now we’ll see if it’s in the final.

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