The stars that football left behind

As Real Madrid manager Carlo Ancelotti ponders whether he should keep Javier Hernandez amid regrets that he may have under-used the on-loan Mexican striker this season, The World Game took the opportunity to examine some other cases where world-class football talent has been left to rot away on the bench.

Radamel Falcao spends another lonely day on the Manchester United bench. (Getty) Source: Getty Images

These are a handful of the best players to have warmed the pine in football. Whether they fell into the 'super-sub' category, or were an emerging star who never got the chance to fulfil their potential, or even a player who found the big dollars at a club where the manager didn't want them, the true extent of their talent will always be a mystery to fans.  

Javier Hernandez

One day Javier Hernandez will be able to able to tell his grand kids he played for Manchester United and Real Madrid. That alone may make all the thinking time spent on the bench at both clubs worth it.

That and the large amounts of money he has collected for doing very little. When 'Chicharito' does get a chance to do the thing he's paid for, he nails it. Take for example his past three games for Madrid, where he's scored four very important goals - so important his manager now wonders whether it was a mistake not to play him more. We reckon we can answer that.  

Radamel Falcao

Speaking of on-loan players, remember when fans wondered how on earth a guy called Diego Costa could ever replace Radamel Falcao at Atletico Madrid? Remember when at the start of the season there weren't enough fish and chips on earth to be wrapped in the amount of column inches dedicated to where Falcao would sign off on his next contract? Those days seem a lifetime ago at the sight of Falcao slumped on the Manchester United bench, again. The hirsuite Colombian seems to personify the transitional troubles that have defined the fallen English giant this season and last. Falcao needs to be the main man to deliver. From the ignominious surrounds of a United bench, overcrowded with overpaid stars, he certainly hasn't done that. 

Gerard Deulofeu

Blink and you'll have missed Deulofeu, one of a number of attacking players thrown up and spat out by Barcelona over the past few years.

Think Isaac Cuenca, Christian Tello, Giovanni Dos Santos and Bojan Krkic, who we'll get to in more detail later. After a fair dose of hype and a handful of fleet-footed cameos down the flanks for Barca, Deulofeu was loaned out to Everton, where it was hoped there would be more opportunities for action without the likes of Lionel Messi, Pedro, Neymar and Iniesta blocking his path. There weren't. Deulofeu warmed the Toffees' pine for 21 matches and came off it as a substitute for 16 of them. This season he's back in Spain, where the benchwarmer tag has followed him to Sevilla. Deufoleu has made 10 starts but watched the referee blow his whistle for kick-off from the bench 18 times. He may have got his chance at Barca, but he's struggled to take it anywhere else. 

Bojan Krkic

These days, it seems all a player needs to do is beat an opponent one-on-one, skin a tiring defender, or score a dazzling goal to be annointed 'the new Messi'. Bojan got the nickname while he was still being made to look good by the actual Messi at Barcelona.

Despite getting more raps than a 90s hip-hop best-of compiation, Krkic left Spain in search of some reputation-enhancing game time, winding up in Italy. Unfortunately, all he found was the bench. In three seasons at Roma and AC Milan he notched up 49 substitute appearances and a single-digit goal tally that had him looking less and less like Messi with each passing week. His past two seasons, at Ajax and Stoke City, have produced more in the way of game minutes, but any hopes Bojan would provide an answer to that age-old debate of how Leo himself would fare on those cold nights at the Britannia, were dashed a long time ago. All Bojan has proven is that he is no Messi. 

David Fairclough

Any player who can score a goal every two-and-a-bit games is doing well. Liverpool redhead Fairclough amassed 55 goals from 153 appearances during the late 1970s and early 80s, of which a startling 61 were from the bench. Among the compelling evidence for a more regular starting berth were his winning goal in the European Cup quarter-final second leg win over St Etienne in 1977 and his seven goals from 14 appearances the season beforehand, helping Liverpool to the championship.

Unfortunately Fairclough's position behind the likes of John Toshack, Kevin Keegan, David Johnson and, later, Ian Rush, meant the original super-sub would remain just that. 

Ole Gunnar Solksjaer

A few years after Fairclough had hung up his boots came Solksjaer, the baby-faced Norwegian who was presented to sceptical Manchester United fans in 1996 as an alternative for the club's preferred target, Allan Shearer. Fairly or not, Solksjaer was the 'other guy' then and that's how he stayed, crafting a stellar career from the cold comfort of the United bench. The man's highlight reel betters that of many others who were given more starts for the Red Devils. There was the 1999 UEFA Champions League final-winning goal against Bayern Munich and the four he scored in 12 incredible minutes off the bench against Nottingham Forest that same season.

Solksjaer became a fan favourite at Old Trafford and a club legend, renowned for winning matches off the bench.

Winston Bogarde

Cue David Attenbrough: this rare shot captures Winston Bogarde actually playing for Chelsea! 

Winston Bogarde may have only played 11 matches in four strange years at Chelsea, but the ammount the club paid for him, much to the chagrin of its managers, probably set the Netherlands international up for life. When Bogarde arrived at Stamford Bridge in 2000, then-Chelsea boss Gianluca Vialli didn't even know about it. Vialli's replacement, Claudio Ranieri, tried to flick Bogarde, but the Dutchman dug his heels in, insisting his value was depreciating with each match for which he wasn't selected. Rumoured to be on upwards of $60,000 a week, Bogarde, who had expressed shock at how much Chelsea paid for him, famously said: "Why should I throw 15 million euros away when it is already mine? At the moment I signed it was in fact my money, my contract."

Dejan Savicevic

Savicevic was part of a $46 million Silvio Burlusconi-induced injection of talent at AC Milan in the early 90s. Problem is the coach, Fabio Capello, had nothing to do with it and didn't rate the Montenegrin playmaker, infamously saying he played a 'Yugoslavian' style, where he expected the players around him to do the hard work.

If this is the Yugoslavian style then we'll take it!

Savicevic struggled to force his way into a Milan line-up that was destroying it in the league and Europe. Public criticism of Capello didn't help his cause, nor did a training ground spat with the coach, in which Savicevic told a team-mate Capello could 'go f*** himself', before storming off while the coach was lecturing him. The game time eventually came for the silky passer as other stars moved on, but his time at Milan was always defined by what could have been, rather than what was.  

Eduardo Vargas

Much like Chicharito, Vargas had a stellar season in the country of his birth immediately before being snapped up by a big European club, in this case cashed-up Napoli.

In 2011, the Chile international had starred for all-conquering Universidad de Chile, scoring 17 goals in 34 league matches and helping the club to the Copa Sudamericana title. Napoli threw the dollars at him and he moved to Italy, much to the chagrin of Napoli's coach at the time, Walter Mazzari, who admitted he didn't know much about the player. Vargas made 39 appearances in the Napoli dugout over his two miserable years at the club, which then sent him out on loan. Over the past two seasons he has had better luck, first at Valencia, then Queens Park Rangers, without ever scaling the same heights he did at Universidad.

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