OUR TEARS FOR SALA
WARNOCK OPENS UP
The death of new signing Emiliano Sala in a plane crash rocked not just Cardiff but the whole football world. A new book – My Kind Of Club: The Inside Story of Neil Warnock’s Cardiff City – reveals the depths of pain felt by the manager and club
NEIL WARNOCK and his Cardiff captain Sol Bamba sat in his office crying. Their world had just caved in.
Emiliano Sala, the Argentine striker they had both persuaded to come to Cardiff to help them escape relegation from the Premier League, was gone, lost in one of the worst tragedies to hit football in years.
The Nantes star, who met his new team- mates the previous weekend, had flown to his old club to say goodbye. The flight back to England never arrived that fateful night of January 21, 2019. Somewhere off the coast of Guernsey, the Piper Malibu aircraft crashed into the English Channel, killing Sala, 28, and pilot David Ibbotson, whose body has never been found.
Warnock, and the French- speaking Bamba, who had helped with translation when the deal was clinched, had grown to like Sala in that short time.
Bamba said: “It made it worse that he’d met a few of the lads. Everyone was looking forward to seeing him coming back and helping us.
“It affected the gaffer in particular. He said he shouldn’t have let him go. He asked me to say to Emiliano, ‘ Come and watch the game [ against Newcastle] and then fly home.’ I remember being with Neil in his office in floods of tears thinking about it.”
Warnock, now in charge at Middlesbrough, said: “I remember going over to Emiliano on the training ground on the Friday and saying, ‘ Do you want to come with us?’ I often think, ‘ Why didn’t I insist?’ But he wanted to get his gear and say goodbye.” The fall- out from Sala’s death continues to this day and has been complex and unpleasant in equal parts. It has included a police inquiry into manslaughter, an ongoing aviation investigation into the crash and a Court of Arbitration for Sport dispute about the £ 15million fee Cardiff were due to pay Nantes.
But, for Warnock and Cardiff, it was utter devastation and heartbreak. Cardiff never recovered. The missing Sala was named on the teamsheet against Arsenal and, after his death was confirmed, they beat Bournemouth in emotional scenes. Warnock, in tears afterwards, said: “We’d have beaten anybody that day.”
A trust fund to help Sala’s family has been launched by the club. But Cardiff found it difficult to attract players to replace him. Warnock said: “They thought it was tempting fate. One said, ‘ I’m sorry, I don’t want to be the one that takes his place’.”