Yahoo Sports The player Pep Guardiola could not solve: N’Golo Kante leaves Chelsea as one of the greats
If there is an epitaph for N’Golo Kante’s seven seasons at Chelsea and eight in the Premier League, then perhaps it should be a message posted on Twitter from the official Manchester City account during the 2021 Champions League final.
With Chelsea a goal up, the tweet simply read: “53. No changes at the break and little chances so far this half – Kante has been everywhere all game, if we can bypass him we might be in business!”
City could not bypass him, just as nobody could when he was fit and firing. Kante has left Chelsea and England to finish his career in Saudi Arabia, having won back-to-back Premier League titles, one of which was with Leicester City, the FA Cup, the Europa League, the Super Cup, the World Club Cup and, best of all, that season’s Champions League.
Kante was named man of the match in the victory against City in Porto, just as he had been in both legs of the semi-final success against Real Madrid and in the second leg of the last-16 victory over Atletico Madrid. Pep Guardiola once called Tottenham ‘the Harry Kane team’, but in the 2021 Champions League run, Chelsea were very much the N’Golo Kante club.
53. No changes at the break and little chances so far this half - Kante has been everywhere all game, if we can bypass him we might be in business!
🔵 0-1 🦁 #ManCity | https://t.co/axa0klD5re pic.twitter.com/vQNvQZQkoJ— Manchester City (@ManCity) May 29, 2021
The £30 million Chelsea spent to sign Kante in the summer of 2016 will go down as one of the best pieces of business in the club’s history. Not only has he been the club’s one truly world-class player across his entire spell at Stamford Bridge, he has also been the most popular player inside and outside the dressing-room.
Kante’s former team-mate Cesc Fabregas, who, along with Eden Hazard, gave him a Brazilian nickname of N’Golinho, could only recall one instance of the France World Cup winner ever being late for training or a team meeting and the reason was predictably wholesome.
Writing for Telegraph Sport, Fabregas said: “One day, we met in the morning, we were playing at night, and everyone was ‘where’s N’Golo, where’s N’Golo, we’re starting the meeting’ and normally he was always on time.
“Eventually, he arrived and everyone started clapping and Antonio (Conte) said ‘what’s happened?’ And he was telling us that he’s had a car crash and some people couldn’t believe it was him and they were taking pictures and he wanted to be polite. His car was all damaged and the wing mirror had to be taped back on, but he still stopped for photographs, even though it made him late!”
It was Kante’s trademark white Mini, which stuck out like a sore thumb parked alongside the fleet of supercars at Chelsea’s Cobham training ground, that he had crashed. The fact he kept the same mobile telephone and seemingly spent very little money or attention on fashion was a cause of constant affectionate ribbing from the 32-year-old’s team-mates.
It had been a personal telephone call from former head coach Conte that helped to clinch Chelsea’s signature of Kante, who had been on the verge of joining Arsenal from Leicester.
Kante had been seen as purely a defensive midfielder, but Conte believed he could be the perfect all-rounder and quickly encouraged him to break lines and dribble forwards.
Reflecting on their time together at Stamford Bridge, Conte said: “He is amazing with and without the ball. When you have N’Golo in your team, you can think you are playing with one player more. You can find a smile on his face every day. He is a very positive guy. He is one of the best players I have had in my career as a coach.”
Thomas Tuchel, who brilliantly kept Kante at his peak for the 2021 Champions League games, was even more effusive in his praise for the man he called ‘NG’ while highlighting just how much Chelsea missed the midfielder when he was injured.
“I think he is our key, key, key player but key, key, key players need to be on the pitch and if he plays only 40 per cent of the games, it is maybe a miracle that we arrive in third place. He is our Mo Salah, our (Virgil) van Dijk, our (Kevin) De Bruyne.
“He is simply that player. He is our Neymar, our Kylian Mbappe, he is the guy who makes the difference and if you only have him 40 per cent, it is a huge problem.
“It is maybe a miracle of how consistent we produce results and puts everything into perspective because I saw Liverpool without Van Dijk and they struggled heavily. You see the difference. N’Golo is our key player but he needs to be on the pitch.”
That warning, at the end of the 2021-22 season, proved to be prophetic as Kante only managed seven league appearances in the campaign just gone as Chelsea slumped to a humiliating 12th-placed finish. Incredibly, it was also only the second season in which Kante did not win at least one trophy with the club.
Chelsea’s newly-appointed head coach Mauricio Pochettino, who wanted to sign Kante for Paris Saint-Germain will be disappointed not to get the chance to work with one of the best midfielders of the modern era, but nobody will begrudge him the chance to earn a reported £86 million alongside Karim Benzema at Saudi Club Al Ittihad. Nobody at Chelsea will have any idea what he will find to spend his money on, either.
Kante leaves Chelsea as a humble legend and the man not even Guardiola could find a way to bypass, just as City’s Twitter account so succinctly acknowledged.
