Chelsea's help
When Chelsea signed Wright Phillips from Manchester City they must have thought they were onto a good thing – and so must the young lad.
He was scoring goals, getting ready to pull on the England shirt each time they played – it all looked good. Chelsea got a terrific player with the world ahead of him.
Then in 2005/6 it fell apart, By mid-January he had not scored a goal for the season, was hardly starting, and maybe only half in the squad.
This benefited Arsenal enormously, because from that point on, young players everywhere who were looking for a big club move started to see a move to Chelsea as a move into the backwaters, rather than a chance to star. And so, by 2006 we were starting to see the same comments appear here there and everywhere. “The player doesn’t really want to go to Chelsea…”
Which of course makes everyone benefit – but mostly Arsenal who have a record in bringing on young players which is so far ahead of everyone else, the rest of football is not even on the map.
But even more to the point we can see what has gone wrong – with the exception of an obscure Norwegian who signed for Man U and had to be bought back at quadruple the price to avoid legal action, Chelsea in 2006 did nothing but buy proven internationals – the youth policy had gone. Not because they didn’t want any youngsters but because none would sign for them.