Football is full of sliding doors moments. Where would Leeds United be right now, for instance, if Andrea Radrizzani and Victor Orta had returned to West Yorkshire in 2018 having failed to convince Marcelo Bielsa to sign up to an ambitious project?
What would have become of them if they had succeeded in their attempts to sign Cody Gakpo, Josko Gvardiol and co a couple of years later. Leeds held talks with Khvicha Kvaratskhelia too, long before the Paris Saint-Germain superstar became a household name in Napoli.
Come the summer, presuming a return to the Premier League can be secured, the Leeds United faithful will look back at those dramatic Pascal Struijk and Ao Tanaka efforts on successive Mondays as turning points.
Yet more sliding doors moments creating ripples which may be felt for years to come.
Three decades earlier prior, meanwhile, if it wasn’t for a breakdown in discussions between Eintracht Frankfurt and Bayern Munich, arguably the most iconic Elland Road moment of Leeds United’s modern era would not have happened.
The Liverpool crossbar would have remained un-shattered. That clenched fist celebration scrubbed out of the sepia-tinged, VHS-recorded tales off yesteryear.
Tony Yeboah would not have secured himself an eternal place in Leeds United – not to mention Premier League – folklore.
How Leeds United snapped up Tony Yeboah under Bayern Munich’s nose
Having won the Bundesliga’s Golden Boot with Eintracht Frankfurt in each of the previous two seasons, the giants of Bayern Munich identified Yeboah as the man capable of playing a starring role in FC Hollywood’s next blockbuster smash.
Bayern were reigning champions in 1995 but had fallen off the pace in a title battle eventually won by Borussia Dortmund.
Now, given that Bayern Munich would go on to win 20 of the next 29 Bundesliga crowns despite missing out on the country’s hottest marksman, it’s fair to that missing out on Yeboah was not a blow with particularly lasting effects.
Yeboah might have far fewer winner’s medals than if he had stayed in Germany.
But, while scoring 32 often spectacular goals in 66 games in West Yorkshire – Tony Yeboah felt his Wimbledon cracker was actually better than that infamous Liverpool winner – the Ghanaian great can take some consolation in knowing he will always be fondly remembered as one of the modern-day icons of a club with such rich history.
“I should have gone to Bayern Munich,” Yeboah explained to GTV Sports Plus. “But Frankfurt would not allow it because the fans would kill them. So they said ‘no, we are not allowing you to go’, even though Bayern were 100 per cent interested.
“I didn’t know Leeds. But, when the offer came, I said ‘why not?’.”
Yeboah wanted to retire at Leeds before George Graham fall-out
“Initially, the trust from Leeds was not there, so they loaned me for the first six months,” adds Yeboah, eventually justifying his £3.4 million transfer fee in style while claiming the club’s Player of the Season award in his first full campaign.
“[But] I was fit and it didn’t take me long to adapt to English football.”
The only real regret Yeboah appears to hold is that his time at Elland Road ended like it did.
Due to what the man himself described as a ‘problem’ between Yeboah and then-manager George Graham, his dream of retiring in West Yorkshire went up in smoke. Though, from a purely financial perspective, winding down a fine career in Qatar did his personal fortune no harm.
“I wanted to retire after Leeds but one coach in Germany talked me out of it,” Yeboah recalled. “And then I went to Hamburg. [After that], I moved to Qatar.
“That was the pension move.”
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