July 27 – Carvalho Goes Blue | On This Football Day

July 27 – Carvalho Goes Blue

EVERY manager has favourites, players they feel they can trust and who they always like to have in their squad. Harry Redknapp has always had a bit of a thing for Shaka Hislop, while Leeds fans will shudder at the thought of Terry Venables bringing his old pal Paul Okon to Elland Road during his ill-fated spell as manager.

Jose Mourinho is no different and he is currently trying to chat up Frank Lampard to take the man he once described as ‘the best player in the world’ to Internazionale.

When he was appointed as Chelsea’s new manager he was up to the same old tricks and on this day in 2004 he raided his former club Porto to buy centre-half Ricardo Carvalho for a whopping £19.85m.

The fee may have been big but Chelsea owner Abramovich has the deepest pockets in football and Carvalho had been doing everything right to ramp up his price tag. The previous season he had been the defensive lynchpin of Mourinho’s team which had won the Portuguese league title along with the European Cup.

He had followed this up by being the best defender at Euro 2004 as Portugal made it all the way to the final on home soil before they were beaten by Greece.

Meanwhile Mourinho had been drafted in at Chelsea to start winning some trophies, and Carvalho was seen as a vital piece of the jigsaw to ensure the club did not end up empty handed come the end of the season as they had under previous boss Claudio Ranieri, especially as Marcel Desailly at left.

Chelsea chief executive Peter Kenyon had on his best smug face when he announced the signing. “We are delighted Ricardo has signed for us as he was being chased by top clubs all over Europe,” he said.

“He proved during Euro 2004 and in the past two seasons with Porto that he is one of the top centre-backs in the game.”

The capture of Carvalho took Chelsea’s summer spending in 2004 to £89m, with Didier Drogba, Mateja Kezman, Tiago, Arjen Robben and Petr Cech also arriving at the club.

After that outlay it would have been criminal not to end up with some silverware that season and Mourinho did what he does best and delivered, with the club winning their first League title for 50 years, and the League Cup for good measure.

Have a look at Carvalho making an impact at the other end of the pitch when he scored a long range effort for Chelsea against Spurs (Blackburn fans note the former Tottenham ‘keeper who lets it in), and watch out for Abramovich’s chumpish celebrations.

Tomorrow we will be back trying to alleviate your Monday morning blues just a touch so join us then, and check out what else happened on this football day here.