article: With John Stones wanting to leave Everton for Chelsea and Saido Berahino eager to leave West Brom for Tottenham, BBC Sport examines the ins and outs of a transfer request. You handed in your transfer request to the owner, Ken Bates. Bates read your transfer request. Bates pulled your contract from his filing cabinet. Bates slammed it on his desk. Bates roared: "It says here you've got two more years at Stamford Bridge! Get out of my office!" You got out of Bates's office. Sharpish. The Chelsea player this story relates to, who shall remain anonymous, stayed at Stamford Bridge for another year, his game presumably severely compromised by his tail, dangling between his legs. "This was an England international," says David Seligman, a football agent and sports lawyer who has worked with the player in question. "But he said handing in that transfer request to Bates was the scariest thing he's ever done." But the days of hovering outside the owner's office, like a sweaty schoolboy clutching a page of lines for the headmaster, are long since over. Roman Abramovich, who bought Chelsea from Bates in 2003, is a suitably scary successor. It's just that the modern player doesn't do his own dirty work. "Players like to hide behind their agents, so they can get the blame if anything goes wrong," says Rachel Anderson, a football agent who also works for clubs, negotiating 'wantaway' deals for their players. Transfer requests, staples of the media world's August silly season, during the run-up to the equally silly transfer deadline day, can take many forms. They can, in theory, be verbal; they can be emails; they can be scrawled in blood on the back of a discarded season ticket. But, normally, they will be letters drafted by agents or legal representatives, with a player's signature at the bottom. "You want it in writing, because a transfer request is essentially a breach of a player's contract," says Seligman. "They can lead to payments becoming void, such as signing-on fees and loyalty bonuses, which are often paid over the course of a player's stay at a club. By signing that letter, a player is saying he is aware of that." So a transfer request is a last resort for most players, especially those plying their trade in the lower divisions. Not because they want to avoid being accused of betrayal by disgruntled fans, but because of the financial implications. Former England Under-21 player Rohan Ricketts recently claimed he was so desperate to leave Arsenal for Tottenham in 2002, and felt so bound by his contract, that he owned up to stealing a team-mate's phone when it wasn't actually him. The club didn't believe him, but they released him anyway. But Premier League superstars, to whom the surrendering of certain contractual payments means little, will usually attempt to negotiate a smoother exit. "Usually a player will talk to the manager first and give his reasons for wanting to leave, not least because handing in a transfer request, especially if that club discovered and nurtured you, doesn't always
summary: Here's what might have happened if you were a player who wanted out of Chelsea Football Club in the 1980s: