Balham FC chief recalls Chelsea, Liverpool trying for Carvalho before Fulham move | OneFootball

Balham FC chiefs have recalled managing a young Fabio Carvalho before his move to Fulham.

Greg Cruttwell, who founded the club now called Balham FC in 2011, took a leading role in handling Carvalho's future.

Along with coach Ollie Kanner, they were entrusted by the Carvalho family, who moved from Lisbon to London in 2013.

“When it got to 14, first of all Fulham had seen him then pretty much every club came calling - Man Utd, Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool," Cruttwell recalled to the Mirror.

"You know how it is with pro clubs -when one or two get a sniff of someone, everyone is immediately interested.

“They want to stop the other clubs getting the diamond in the rough, and Fabio is definitely that."

The big clubs all came calling as Cruttwell and Kanner insisted they go through Balham in order to negotiate with Carvalho.

One unnamed club opted to bypass the, insisting on contacting the Carvalho family directly in a bid to sneak in through the back door.

“That really upset the parents," he recalls. “Ultimately, that probably ruled that particular club out of the picture."

“There was a whole circus around it," Cruttwell admits.

“His parents wanted me and Balham to handle things for them at the time as they hardly spoke any English at the time, and there was an awful lot of pressure on them.

“Arsenal and Chelsea doing everything to get him, Man United flew down from Carrington to meet me in a secondary school portacabin in Balham at a venue we trained at.

“But Fulham were at the front of the queue, and they were brilliant. They were the most professional, and their academy is obviously a top academy, even if the first team isn't at the same level as the others.

“Obviously going to Cobham or Carrington is like going to Disneyland for a kid, but his parents saw past that and saw the people at Fulham were more than just football people.