The transfers that never quite happened are always more interesting than the ones that did because like unfulfilled potential, they offer a ‘what if’ to ponder. They also provide a distraction from reality, which is often a bit shit.
In terms of the ones that got away for Cardiff, Jarrod Bowen is by far the most interesting because of how successful he has gone on to be, but also due to the nature of player he is. Cardiff lacked that sort of high-intensity attacker, in the Craig Bellamy mould, for so long that it made Bowen slipping through the net, twice, all the more galling.
First time around, Bowen was spotted while playing for Hereford’s youth team and offered an ultimately unsuccessful six-week trial at Cardiff when Hereford’s youth team folded. “My dad took the call from Cardiff and I just cried,” Bowen told the Daily Mail years later. “I didn’t know what would happen. I hadn’t really tried at school as all I wanted was football, but suddenly, that was it. No football. I don’t know what would have happened to me. Maybe I would have worked in a gym or something, but every footballer needs a slice of luck and mine came when Hereford started that team up again, I went back.”
Former Cardiff academy chief James McCarthy had just started working with the youth set-up at the time and is able to provide some context. “I was a part-time Under-16’s coach at the time, teaching full-time in the day and coaching in the evening and on weekends. Jarrod came in as an Under-15 for a six-week trial, so a good period of time. He came in as a central midfielder and you could see he was a nice player technically, but at that stage in his development, he was nowhere near the physical specimen he is now, in terms of his pace and dynamic ability.”
“If I remember rightly, he came in April or May, around the easter holidays, so he would have got four or five, maybe even six games. We even tried him on the left wing and he didn’t really do anything to catch our eye. Basically, he wasn’t better than what we had in those positions at that time. He was in Hereford’s junior section, but they were going through some financial difficulty, so were not an academy and more of a development set-up. He went back to Hereford and about two years later, he was breaking in to their first-team.”
“We had constant communication about how he was getting on and progressing, but after we didn’t take him in the first place, I think the ship had sailed for us in terms of getting him back because he was then gaining plenty of attention from elsewhere. I guess the fact that we had the opportunity to sign him and he’s gone on to bigger and better things means that he was the one that got away, but if you speak to the guys at Chelsea’s academy, there is still talk about them missing out on Declan Rice. It’s not that we signed him, had him in the system and let him go, we almost had him and he didn’t make the most of his opportunity with us. You can only take your hat off to him though.”
Fortunately for Bowen, his former youth team manager, Peter Beale, was promoted to Hereford’s senior manager and he was fast tracked to the first team. From there, he eventually joined Hull where 22 goals in 2018-19 season attracted Cardiff once again.
Bowen has since revealed that a £12m offer was tabled towards the end of the January transfer window, with Cardiff struggling for goals in the Premier League. It was in the aftermath of the Emiliano Sala tragedy and Bowen has since admitted, again to Mailsport, that “the whole situation was very uncomfortable.”
“It was nothing to do with how I view Cardiff as a club and any player will tell you it’s their dream to play in the Premier League, but the whole story around Sala was just so tragic. I know it caused a lot of shock and upset in our dressing-room at Hull and I am sure it was the same around the country. To join Cardiff knowing that he was meant to play for them would have been incredibly difficult and not something that filled me with any enthusiasm. Of course, any transfer would have needed Hull’s approval in any case, but from my personal point of view, it was never a starter. Not under those circumstances. It just felt wrong.”
Bowen’s upward trajectory continued and 12 months later, he was joining West Ham for £18m, which could eventually rise to £25m. He has taken the step up in his stride, playing as a central attacker or cutting in from the right, and made his senior England debut in June against Hungary.
Who knows if Bowen would have thrived to the same extent at Cardiff, on either occasion. He would have been joining an academy that was at the time lacking a pathway to the first-team and in the Premier League, he might well have ended up back in the Championship six months later. Alternatively, he might have provided the spark that would have kept them in the top-flight and gone on to provide a substantial profit on their initial investment further down the line.
The final word goes to McCarthy. You win some and you lose some, but it just proves that rejection comes with the territory and if you have the right attitude, it need not be the end of the road. “The one thing it does show to all young players is that you should never give up. It shows the importance of mental toughness to go with ability. The resilience to never give in. We always used to say to everyone that our opinion at Cardiff was just one of 92. If you’ve got the right support system in place, you can still go on to have further opportunities elsewhere.”