Former Chelsea defender Frank Leboeuf has revealed how he once rejected a transfer to Liverpool
Liverpool and Chelsea might have forged a bitter rivalry over the past two decades, but that hasn’t stopped a number of players from representing both clubs.
Thirteen players have lined up for both during the Premier League era, with six of them making direct transfers between Anfield and Stamford Bridge. Meanwhile, when the two clubs lock horns at Wembley in the League Cup final on Sunday, both Mohamed Salah and Raheem Sterling will be hoping to get one over on their former sides.
However, sometimes the allegiance to a former club is too strong for a player to later join a rival. This proved to be the case for one World Cup winner back in 2002.
Frank Leboeuf joined Chelsea in a £2.5m move from Strasbourg in 1996, and would go on to make 203 appearances during five years at Stamford Bridge. During his time with the club, he’d win two FA Cups, the League Cup, the UEFA Cup Winners’ Cup, the European Super Cup and the Community Shield.
Also winning the 1998 World Cup, Euro 2000 and 2001 Confederations Cup with France, he returned to his homeland to sign for Marseille in the summer of 2001. Yet after just one year back in Ligue 1, he claims that Liverpool tried to bring him back to the Premier League.
“Liverpool tried to sign me when Gerard Houllier was in charge,” Lebouef recalled to BetVictor. “(It was) just after the 2002 World Cup.
“Houllier called me and we talked, but back then Liverpool wasn’t as attractive a club as it is right now. I loved Steve McManaman and Robbie Fowler and players like that and I admired them in the 1970s, but they were not my club.
“I made a promise when I was playing for Chelsea that I would never play for another English club, because Chelsea made me. I get the opportunity to speak in many countries across the world, not because I won the World Cup or anything like that, but because I played for Chelsea.
“Chelsea are my club. Sometimes the club upsets me, especially in the last two years with the way it is being run, but it is still my club and I will defend them until my last breath.
“It would’ve been nice to play at Anfield, but I have played there as the opponent and I wasn’t interested in trying to make a move happen. I am very pleased to be able to say that I only ever played for Chelsea in the Premier League.”
Lebouef was 34 when Liverpool reportedly tried to sign him, and had just finished second in the Premier League in the 2001/02 season. The year before they had won a cup treble. In contrast, Marseille would finish 15th in Ligue 1 prior to the Frenchman’s arrival in 2001, before finishing ninth in 2001/02.
Meanwhile, Sami Hyypia, Jamie Carragher and Stephane Henchoz were Houllier’s leading centre-back options heading into the 2002/03 season, with the likes of Markus Babbel, Abel Xavier, and Djimi Traore also able to play the position.
While the Reds would infamously sign El Hadji Diouf, Salif Diao and Bruno Cheyrou that summer, they did not strengthen their squad at centre-back.
