305: Andrei Kanchelskis, Manchester United, Merlin’s Premier League 95 Sticker Collection

Today Richard Allinson has a look at an exceptional footballer who lit up the Premier League in its formative years and was unplayable on his day. We need to say thanks to the brilliant bar staff at the Football Tavern on Twitter for this suggestion and it kind of came as a surprise that none of us had written anything about him already. The mere mention of this wing wizard brought back bad memories for Oldham Athletic fans who suffered the double heartbreak of a late Mark Hughes equaliser in an FA Cup semi-final and the return of today’s subject from suspension for the replay which finished 4-1 to the Red Devils. Sorry to bring it up again. Over to Rich.

“Schmeichel, Parker, Pallister! Irwin, Bruce, Sharpe and Ince! Hughes, McClair, Keane and Cantona! Robson, Kanchelskis and Giggs... DA NA NAA, DA NA NAA!” In 1994, Status Quo spent two weeks at the top of the UK charts with ‘Come On You Reds’, their power-pop FA Cup final song for Manchester United. My middle school team decided to rewrite the words to help support our participation in a local five-a-side tournament around the same time and although we made a noble effort to shoehorn all our names in, the one we really struggled to replicate was Kanchelskis. Funnily enough, there weren’t so many three syllable Russian surnames kicking around West Yorkshire in the early 1990s. However, in lieu of a tribute to him in 1994, I’ll try to make it up to Mr Kanchelskis now.

The Man United team that Status Quo so cheerily bellowed about was probably the first great side compiled by S’Alex Ferguson and looking back at it now it is amazing that so many of them were signed on the cheap. Paul Ince cost £1m; Denis Irwin was only £625,000; Schmeichel arrived for £500,000 and King Eric cost a mere £1.2m. Even allowing for inflation these are bargain buys, especially when compared with the £59.7m they spaffed on Ángel di María or the £47m whizzed up the wall on Fred. Kanchelskis very much fitted the mould of shrewd transfer business, costing only £650,000 from Shakthar Donetsk in March 1991 and in his four years at Old Trafford it was to prove to be money well spent as he contributed 48 goals from the right wing in 145 games on the way to winning two Premier League titles, one FA Cup, one League Cup, two Charity Shields and one European Super Cup before he was sold on to Everton for £5m. 

However, things didn’t quite get off on the right footing for the young Russian in his early days at Old Trafford. In fact he is lucky that he didn’t have a stray boot twatted into his face “by accident” by his manager like his replacement on the right hand side of the United midfield. I say this because in his autobiography Russian Winters, Kanchelskis recounted this story of an early conversation with Alex Ferguson: “Whenever a foreign footballer comes into a dressing room, he will be taught to swear... They also taught me the correct way to address the manager of Manchester United. Almost the first time I came across Alex Ferguson he said to me ‘All right Andrei, how’s it going?’ I smiled at him and replied, ‘F*** off, Scottish bastard.’ Ferguson stopped dead in his tracks and then began to smile as he heard laughter echoing down the corridor, as I stood there bewildered.” From what I can gather from books and podcasts by retired footballers, things like this seem to have been lost from the modern game which to me is to its detriment. What probably also doesn’t happen much in the modern game either is that a player doesn’t bother buying any boots when joining a club because he guessed that he wouldn’t be taking part in training straight away, only to have to run out to a local sports shop to buy a pair that don’t fit on being told that he is playing in a friendly the next day. Nice one, Andrei. 

As good a knack as Fergie had for signing a player, he also had a curious ability to let players go when they were seemingly at the peak of their game. Jaap Stam and Ruud van Nistelrooy are probably the most famous examples, but the decision to sell Kanchelskis to Everton was also a bit odd considering he had just finished the 1994/95 season as United’s top scorer with 15 goals, claiming the Sir Matt Busby Player of the Year trophy in the process. Then again, David Beckham was waiting in the wings so I’ll let Ferguson off I suppose. Fergie also mentioned in his autobiography, Managing My Life, that he was offered a £40,000 bribe to sell Kanchelskis, which, when refused, allegedly resulted in death threats to then United Chairman, Martin Edwards. I mean, I couldn’t be arsed dealing with that sort of nonsense either, so again, fair play for selling him. Kanchelskis and Everton weren’t involved in, or even aware of, the threats or bribes so all in all, that episode of his time with the Red Devils seems rather bizarre. 

Anyway, bribing shithousery aside, what the Toffees did get was a world class player and a proven winner and Andrei was to highlight his pedigree when he banged in 16 goals in his debut season on Merseyside. This was sadly to be the peak of his time at Goodison Park as injury, lack of form and an apparent lack of interest saw him moved on to Fiorentina for a fee of 15 billion lira. That is 15 billion. I miss batshit European currencies. Despite getting to wear the snazzy Nintendo sponsored purple kit of La Viola, things didn’t work out too well in Italy as an injury hit couple of seasons saw him only play 26 games and score two goals. From here, he went to Rangers when they were actually good and won a ton of trophies; he had a couple of (literally, in my case) forgettable spells at Manchester City and Southampton; played three games in Saudi Arabia, before returning home for 39 games for the fantastically named Saturn Moscow Oblast, before finally wrapping up his career with Russian second division side Krylia Sovetov in 2006. 

So Andrei Kanchelskis then, he had a great career, especially during his time in England and Scotland. He also, by virtue of the fact that the aforementioned Status Quo song was credited to the whole Manchester United squad, technically had a number 1 hit single. Come on you Reds!