“One thing” which was crucial to Chelsea landing Cole Palmer, Enzo Maresca and Romeo Lavia | OneFootball

Success has many fathers, while failure is an orphan. That’s what they say, and Chelsea are really proving that aphorism correct at the moment.

After a long period of tension and difficulty at the club, a good patch of form – potentially signalling that a corner has been turned – has seen both sporting directors suddenly pop their heads above the parapet now the criticism has turned to praise.

But for former Blue Ryan Bertrand, the real credit should go to another figure in our famously Byzantine sporting structure – Joe Shields.

Joe Shields with a Chelsea logo.s

Joe Shields given big boost for role in Palmer deal

“First and foremost, when it comes to Cole, you’ve got to recognise that one thing Chelsea have done under this new ownership, is they’ve hired fantastically well in the director roles – and a guy called Joe Shields has got to take a lot of credit… he’s the director of talent at Chelsea, and he’s brought in some amazing players… Cole [Palmer] ]being one of them, Bertrand was quoted as saying by CaughtOffside.

“He worked with him at Manchester City, so knew him inside out. People knew he was a good player, because he was at City, but not many people knew just how good he could be. Joe backed himself and requested to bring Cole in, and in doing so, he’s brought in the best player in the Premier League right now.”

Shields indeed deserves huge credit for that coup, and might well be getting even more attention had Romeo Lavia (another player he pushed for) not spent most of last year injured. If Lavia established himself this season, there’s no doubt there will be credit in the pipeline for the former Man City youth recruitment guru – who apparently also backed Enzo Maresca as another former City colleague of his.