He’s the WAN that got away!
FORMER RECRUITMENT CHIEF REVEALS THE £50m PREM ACE WHO ALMOST SIGNED FOR CITY
COVENTRY City were ‘really close’ to signing a current Premier League star – now worth £50 million – on a free transfer, it has emerged.
Former Sky Blues head of recruitment Tommy Widdrington has revealed that he’d lined up a deal to bring in a young development player from Crystal Palace at the back end of 2017/18 as Mark Robins’ men were pushing for promotion out of League Two.
That player was Aaron Wan-Bissaka who was unexpectedly promoted to the first team due to injuries, and his career suddenly took off on a meteoric rise that resulted him establishing himself as a top-flight regular at Selhurst
Park before being snapped up by Manchester United.
The England Under-21 right-back signed a five-year contract at Old Trafford last summer with Palace receiving an initial fee of £45 million, with another £5m due in potential bonuses.
Upon signing for United, Wan-Bissaka became the sixth-most expensive defender of all time and the most expensive English player who was uncapped by the national side at the time of transfer. Immediately establishing himself in Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s side, Wan-Bissaka has played in every one of the Red Devils’ Premier League games to date this season. But had circumstances been different, had Palace not been struck down with injuries, Coventry City could have got their hands on a gold mine of a player who would have been ripping it up in League One last season before, inevitably, being sold for a huge profit. Widdrington, who left the Sky Blues to join Bristol Rovers shortly after the
I had watched him at move fell through, the Under-23s for revealed in an interview months and said to about his career in scouting and recruitment: Mark (Robins) that this “There’s some there that kid’s going to be a come out of scope. good full-back. “A great example is Aaron Wan-Bissaka, I tried Tony Widdrington to get him on a free to Coventry and was close, really close. “But then he got into the Palace team due to two freak injuries.
“I had watched him at the Under-23s playing on the wing for months and said to Mark (Robins) that this kid’s going to be a good fullback, he’s not yet but he will be. Then off he went. Some players will get a move that you just didn’t see coming or their club will sell them or whatever.”