Nigerian striker John Obi Mikel has urged Manchester United to allow him to choose which club he plays for. BBC Radio Five Live revealed that United have asked Fifa to consider sanctions against Chelsea, who they accuse of hijacking Mikel’s move to Old Trafford.
But the 18-year-old’s lawyer said in a statement:
“Mikel is very concerned United have failed to accept his decision as to where he wants to play Nor have they entered into any sort of constructive dialogue to resolve this. Mikel is caught in the middle of a dispute between Manchester United and Chelsea. He is intent that that should change. To be able to achieve his footballing dreams, he demands that matters are resolved quickly between those interested in his future.
He has already put himself in the hands of the footballing authorities. He calls upon them to intervene. Whatever agenda the respective football clubs involved in this dispute have, they must not be allowed to damage Mikel’s career.“
United and Chelsea have been battling over the 18-year-old since April 2005. Mikel signed a deal with United from Norwegian side Lyn Oslo but later said he had been forced to put pen-to-paper and wanted to join Chelsea. It emerged on Monday that United and Lyn then wrote to Fifa, claiming that agents acting on behalf of Chelsea attempted to induce the player to breach agreements he had made. They want Fifa to consider imposing a transfer ban on the Blues as well as barring them from certain tournaments.
But Chelsea hit back at the claims, saying they were “without foundation“.
Opinion
It is Man United Blog’s opinion that this is very much a storm in a tea cup. While it’s great sport pointing out to the world how unethical and sleazy Chelsea are in the transfer market, it’s not really worth the fuss over a player who is at best gifted, but unproven- and at worst greedy, fickle waste of time.
What we want in our squad are players who show true dedication and loyalty to the club, of which there is no finer example from recent transfers than Ji-Sung Park. We would also refer you back to two of our previous posts begging MU to just buy a temporary, hardened, experienced English midfielder from the Premeirship- and we even earmarked Danny Murphy on both occasions for the job. How depressing that he has now joined Tottenham, showing that he really was available. And it is further worrisome to see how Tottenham seem to be attracting a base of decent English midfielders- such as Carrick and Jenas, while we seem to need to resort to converting forwards and defenders to fill in the gaps.
For that matter, Edgar Davids might have fitted the bill as well…..