10 Players Who Stole A Living From Chelsea

2. Winston Bogarde

What's this? Winston Bogarde not top of a list about players stealing a living from Chelsea? Ridiculous! Go home and write out the club's history 50 times on a school blackboard, post-haste! Bogarde is one of the single most reviled players in the long traditional of misjudged Chelsea transfers and with good reason. He was signed in 2000/01 from Barcelona, seen as a coup by the club due to his status as an established Dutch international. Manager Gianluca Vialli later revealed he had no idea about the transfer until the player was on his doorstep, or about the departure of Emerson Thome, sold to Sunderland to make room for the new arrival despite his being on the way to becoming a fan favourite following several outstanding performances alongside Marcel Desailly. Despite his high profile reputation, Bogarde hadn't enjoyed the best time at Barcelona, contributing to what was seen as a highly unstable defence. His move to Chelsea appeared cursed from the beginning, with manager Vialli soon being replaced by Claudio Ranieri, who took an almost instant dislike to the Dutchman. Bogarde was quickly declared persona non grata at the club and attempts were made to find a buyer. Unfortunately, no-one was willing to match or even come close to the £40k per week wages which Chelsea were paying and Bogarde, feeling entitled to the money he had been offered, refused to leave and honoured his contract down to the smallest detail in order to deny the club any legal basis for sacking him. He later admitted that even he was amazed at how much the club had offered him and having grown up in poverty, refused to bow to pressure to leave despite being well aware of his reputation among supporters. When his contract finally expired in 2004, his years of little to no playing time led to him failing to secure a deal elsewhere and he retired from football. So why is he not top of this list? Well, while Bogarde's cynicism and shamelessness cannot be denied, much of the fault lies with Chelsea for offering ridiculous terms to a player not even being close to justifying them, against the wishes of their manager. Bogarde has a point when he says the wages he took home were rightfully his, even if his opportunism deserves every bit of scorn it received. Unlike the player in the top spot, Bogarde never broke the terms of his contract, even if he did cost the club a lot of money for nothing.