It's a sale Chelsea must regret with every passing performance and Frank Lampard has now weighed in on Kevin De Bruyne's departure from Stamford Bridge.
The Belgian international completed his £50million move to the Etihad Stadium in 2015. With game time at Stamford Bridge hard to come by, De Bruyne headed over to Wolfsburg and made a name for himself in the Bundesliga.
City then swooped in to land his services and they have not looked back since, with De Bruyne one of the world stars in football and best midfielders in the sport. Lampard - a former team mate of the 31-year-old's - will be looking to keep him quiet in Sunday's meeting between City and Chelsea. His exit from the Blues under Jose Mourinho, in the eyes of Lampard, came at a time when competition was fierce.
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"I don’t know the answer to that," said Lampard. "That’s a club answer. All I know is that Kevin is a fantastic player. In that situation, we were a bit stacked in that area. Eden (Hazard) was here, (Juan) Mata was here, (Andre) Schurrle was here and to be fair, I remember Kevin had a real desire and hunger to play.
"I don’t know personally what happened between him, the club and the manager at the time. I liked him when he was with us at Chelsea and we were team-mates and I like him now as a top-class midfield player. When I think back to his time at Chelsea, at that time we were mainly playing a 4-2-3-1 formation - and I was playing a bit deeper as one of the two sixes.
"Kevin was fighting more for the No.10 position or one of the two wide players. I could respect the fact that he wanted to show the level of talent that he has got. He has gone from strength to strength. That probably undervalues his incredible rise as a player. I love watching him play as a midfielder to find the assists, goals. And with his range of passing and weight of passing is - if not the best we’ve seen in the league - it is right near the very top."
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