Ex-Chelsea midfielder, Michael Essien has revealed the club he almost joined before signing a transfers to Chelsea from Lyon in 2005.
For the Ghanaian player, he had gone to Liverpool’s Melwood training ground to hold talks with Gerrard Houllier, the then reds coach.
I had a lot of offers when I was at Bastia. I was close to signing for Liverpool when Gerard Houllier was their coach
XI even went to Melwood to meet the coach. We had a talk, and I returned to France, but the offers were still coming.
PSG, Olympique Marseille et al., but I told Bastia I did not want to move, and they also did not want to sell me at that time because they wanted me to stay for another year which was fine with me because I also did not want to leave the club.
So I stayed for another season, that is my third year with the club.
Lyon joined the three aforementioned clubs to enquire about me, but I thought it was too early to move to England.
That was why I joined Lyon and later moved to Chelsea under Mourinho [in 2005].
Lyon was my favourite team when I went to France because they were winning everything. I told my agent that if Lyon has come into the picture, I would like to join them. He added.
He spent 9 years at Chelsea before leaving in 2014 to join Serie A giant, AC Milan.
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