David O’Leary has revealed Leeds United tried to sign Frank Lampard before his move to Chelsea in 2001, and hindsight shows it may have been one of the biggest missed transfers in the club’s history.
Leeds were one of the Premier League’s most ambitious clubs at the start of the century under David O’Leary, reaching a Champions League semi-final in 2001 with one of the youngest squads in Europe.
O’Leary won 101 of his 203 games as Leeds manager and aggressively targeted elite young talent, with Lampard one of England’s most promising players after scoring 39 goals in 187 games for West Ham.
Lampard in a Leeds United shirt?! 🤔
O'Leary says Leeds attempted to sign Lampard.
Leeds also missed out on another England star, Steve McManaman, at that time. On Stick To Football, O’Leary revealed Leeds came close to landing the midfielder before Chelsea secured the deal instead.
“Remember van Bommel. He was interested because he was young, he’d seen a young, vibrant team. We tried to get Lampard, met Frank, but just top guy, top fella, chose well – he went to Chelsea instead.”
Frank Lampard choosing Chelsea changed everything
Lampard instead joined Chelsea in 2001 for £11m, a move that transformed both his career and Chelsea’s future. He went on to become Chelsea’s all-time leading scorer with 211 goals in 648 appearances.
Lampard also won three Premier League titles, the Champions League, four FA Cups and the Europa League during a remarkable spell at Stamford Bridge.
Leeds already had major attacking talent in players such as Harry Kewell, Mark Viduka and Alan Smith, but Lampard’s consistency, goals and durability were qualities the club never truly replaced as the team began to break apart.
At the time Leeds still looked capable of competing with Chelsea financially and on the pitch, which makes O’Leary’s admission even more significant more than two decades later.
Leeds collapsed while Lampard’s career exploded
Leeds’ failure to sign Lampard came just before the club’s financial model started to unravel under chairman Peter Ridsdale.By the end of 2002, Leeds’ debt had reached £78.9m.
The club’s financial collapse became one of the defining cautionary tales in English football. Leeds were relegated from the Premier League in 2004 before entering administration in 2007.
The club spent 16 years outside the Premier League. While Leeds spiralled downward, Chelsea became one of Europe’s dominant clubs with Lampard central to their success during the Roman Abramovich era.
Frank Lampard and Leeds now have a genuine rivalry
The irony is that Leeds once desperately wanted a player who later became deeply unpopular among the club’s supporters. Lampard is one of the club’s biggest rivals, which has developed in the last decade.
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This team had some special players
Lampard’s rivalry with Leeds intensified during his spell as Derby County manager following the infamous Spygate controversy involving Marcelo Bielsa in 2019.
Derby then beat Leeds in the Championship play-off semi-finals at Elland Road, after Leeds fans mocked Lampard with chants of “Stop Crying Frank Lampard” to the tune of Oasis’ “Stop Crying Your Heart Out”.
Patrick Bamford recalled a phone call between Lampard and Bielsa, in which the former was not happy. Since then, bizarrely, Lampard has claimed he wasn’t actually that bothered by Spygate.
O’Leary’s comments now serve as a reminder that Leeds once had the chance to sign a player who became one of the Premier League’s defining midfielders, only for Lampard to choose a completely different path that ultimately left Chelsea celebrating and Leeds collapsing.
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