‘I’m Chelsea ace who snubbed United after ‘Russian mafia strikes’ from Abramovich’
John Obi Mikel says he would have signed for Manchester United had it not been for Roman Abramovich’s alleged “Russian mafia moves”.
The Chelsea icon, 36, was on the centre of some of the controversial switch sagas in current reminiscence again in 2005. Both United and Chelsea claimed they’d struck an settlement with Mikel when he was enjoying for Norwegian outfit Lyn, however the legitimacy of their respective claims have been blemished by accusations of impropriety, intimidation and even kidnapping.
Eventually, Mikel signed for Chelsea, with the Blues paying United a compensatory charge to finish the saga. And in keeping with the Nigerian, it was the shady antics of former Chelsea proprietor Abramovich that sealed the deal.
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“It’s a long story, it went on for a year. One day I’m going to make a movie about it,” Mikel mentioned talking at Web Summit Qatar lately. “Everyone knows I signed a pre-contract at Man United, but I wasn’t 18 so it wasn’t technically legal. Then Chelsea came in and said ‘listen, come to Chelsea’.”
Mikel defined that he was being ordered by FIFA to not converse with both United or Chelsea whereas the state of affairs was being sorted out, however that did not cease Abramovich from organising a sneaky work-around.
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“Roman did his Russian mafia moves [laughs]… what Roman and the club used to do is pick me up from a spot in London, drop me off at the train station, a different car then comes and picks me up, drops me off somewhere else, then another car comes and picks me up.
“It was positively Russian strikes! But on the finish of the day we obtained it accomplished, so everybody was pleased.”
The saga began when Chelsea helped organised Mikel’s move to Lyn in 2004 with a view to signing him when he turned 18 a year later. While they were waiting, United got in contact with the midfielder and managed to strike a deal, but the contract was deemed illegitimate as the Manchester club had bypassed Mikel’s agents and persuaded the teenager to sign the contract without any representation.
(Image: AFP through Getty Images)
Chelsea subsequently issued counter declare, insisting they’d signed an settlement with Mikel and his brokers, although Lyn denied this. Things obtained so messy that United unexpectedly organized a press convention with a view to ‘announce’ the signing of Mikel, who was pictured sporting a United prime. This led to accusations the participant had been threatened to journey to Manchester and seem on the convention.
The craziness went up one other gear when Mikel went lacking, solely to reappear in London 9 days later. The Nigerian informed Sky Sports News he’d been pressured into signing his United contract with out an agent current and insisted he wished to affix Chelsea as an alternative.
(Image: Getty Images)
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The challenge was then taken to FIFA, who spent the subsequent few months looking for an answer. During this time, Mikel revealed Sir Alex Ferguson demanded a one-on-one assembly with him, satisfied he might make the participant change his thoughts about rejecting United.
“Before I went in [to the meeting with Ferguson], my agent said, ‘Anything he says just do this [shakes head]’. So I went in and he tried to offer me more money than Chelsea, but I listened to my agent and Ferguson left angry.”
(Image: Getty Images)
Chelsea ended up signing Mikel in 2006 after agreeing to pay Man United a charge of £12million, and Lyn a charge of £4m. He went on to make 372 appearances for the London membership, successful two Premier League titles, 4 FA Cups and the Champions League.
