John Obi Mikel reborn as Chelsea's undisputed pass master
Who is the best passer in the Premier League? John Obi Mikel? Over the last three seasons Chelsea’s holding midfielder has a higher pass-completion ratio than any other player in the top flight (89.93 per cent — Paul Scholes is second with 89.88).
He has made an astonishing 4,598 passes (over 1,000 more than Scholes – just think about how many that actually is). He is the beating heart of this Chelsea team, moving the ball with metronomic precision.
Ah, but it’s easy enough to keep completing passes when all you do is move the ball 10 yards sideways, no? Like the departed Ray Wilkins, is Mikel not just a midfield crab, safely shifting the ball laterally from one harmless position to another?
Until this season that was a fair enough accusation (although one that underestimates the importance a short pass can have) but this season Carlo Ancelotti has made Mikel something of a pet project.
When looking at ways of squeezing improved performances out of his champions he alighted on Mikel’s relatively passive role in attacking the opposition. The work is born out in the stats: he hits twice as many forward passes as he used to (two in five rather than one in five).
“Carlo’s always talking to me,” Mikel said as he broke off from preparing for today’s home game against Sunderland. “One of the things that everyone has been pointing out about my game is that I’m playing a lot more forward passes and I think that’s one thing he has helped me add to my game this season.
"I have a very good understanding with him and I hope it keeps going like this. He’s always there to give me advice and I take it, whether he’s criticising me or giving me positive advice. He played the same role I played so maybe he is trying to make me be a bit like him.”
What Ancelotti is actually doing is not teaching new skills but awakening old ones that have lain dormant in Mikel. As a teenager he had a global reputation as one of the outstanding players of his generation.
Five years ago he led an exciting Nigeria team to the final of the Under 20 World Cup, where they lost to Argentina. Mikel, a skilful playmaker, was voted the second best player at the tournament.
The best? Lionel Messi.
When he finally signed for Chelsea the following summer, in June 2006, life had got a lot more complicated for Mikel. The squabble between the Londoners and Manchester United to sign him from Lyn Oslo bore all the hallmarks of an airport thriller.
“It was a hard time, a difficult time, for me,” he said. “It put a lot of pressure on me. I didn’t expect it to go that way I just wanted a normal transfer, but obviously it went on for more than a year.
"I went to Lyn Oslo and played maybe just five or six games and then it all happened. I’ve always said this is where I want to be. People said you’re not going to get games because there are lots of big players.
“People were putting pressure on me, about the decision of whether to go to Chelsea or United. I made my choice and stuck by it.”
After all the hype about his talent and the publicity over the transfer Mikel did not make the most auspicious start to his new career.
On the pitch he was played as a defensive midfielder despite, by his admission, not knowing how to tackle; off the pitch he repeatedly failed to adhere to the clubs’ disciplinary standards. Were it not for the faith of Jose Mourinho, his career might have been over before it had really begun.
“Jose was the one who went to the team and said, 'I want this boy, I want this player’,” he said. “The club were saying 'we’re fighting a lost battle’ but he kept going. He tried as much as he could to change my personality, my game.
“Every time I did something wrong, every mistake I made, he would get Didier Drogba to talk to me. I was off it, I didn’t know what I was doing. It was hard for me to take responsibility. I’d never been at a professional club. I’d only been at Lyn for a few months and things weren’t done professionally like they are here.
“I came into training late, I wasn’t wearing the right things. It was just crazy and every time I did something wrong Jose would speak to Drogba or Geremi and get them to speak to me.
"These guys tried to make me understand that I was at a professional club and had to take responsibility. I think that’s what I did, made changes to my game and to my professional conduct.”
A large part of the problem is that Mikel lacked structure in his life. He grew up in what he describes as a “very religious household” in the northern Nigerian city of Jos.
“I would wake up every day at six o clock and the whole family would kneel together and pray,” he said. “We had a statue of Jesus Christ and we’d pray for 30 minutes or an hour. It was compulsory every single day.”
At 23 he feels he is back on the right path, that the club has become his “family” — his Chelsea team-mates tease him, calling Ancelotti his 'father’ for the attention the manager devotes to him — and he has even started to offer some fatherly advice of his own to the likes of Gael Kakuta and Patrick van Aanholt.
“I love playing here, “ he said. “There are so many nice guys, the players and the staff, everyone. It is more like a home for me. I love England and I love London so why go somewhere else? I want to see this club win trophies and I want to be part of it. I want to stay here for the rest of my career.”
How Mikel move turned into a saga
John Obi Mikel’s move to Chelsea from Lyn Oslo in 2006 is still shrouded in mystery. Manchester United believed they had secured his signature and even unveiled him in a press conference.
But Chelsea claimed they had also signed him and there were rumours that Mikel had been subject to threatening phone calls.
The Norwegian club’s director Morgan Andersen (who was afterwards convicted of fraud) accused his agent, John Shittu, of kidnapping the player. Mikel claimed he had been pressured into signing for United.
It took nearly a year of negotiations before he signed for Chelsea (they paid United £12million and Lyn £4million).
The Chelsea midfielder has become the top flight’s most prolific passer over the past three seasons.
89.9: Mikel’s passing accuracy with Chelsea
267: John Terry is the second-most prolific passer, but has still made 267 fewer than Mikel
60: Mikel’s shooting accuracy is 60 per cent this season, compared to 11% and 27% in past two campaigns
0: The Nigerian has still not scored in the league since joining Chelsea in 2006
