He wanted to sign the future Ballon d'Or winner from West Ham but the transfer was too expensive; he then won the Champions League and joined Chelsea.

Harry Redknapp has managed some of the best talents in his career, but he was denied the chance to coach one of the greatest.

Having achieved TottenhamSouthampton, Portsmouth and Bournemouth during his career, Redknapp has coached elite stars such as Gareth Bale, Luka modric, Fernando RiverPaolo Di Canio and Sol Campbell, although he did occupy a position certain weak point for Niko Kranjcar.

But while I was in charge of West HamA young forward entered through the doors that would leave Red button stunned.

Shevchenko, just a teenager at the time, was just starting his career in 1994 while at Dynamo Kyiv and the Hammers gave him the chance to impress.

After scoring two goals, Redknapp was interested in signing the Ukrainian, but could not justify such a high price.

Speaking to Sky sportsThe legendary English manager was asked how close he came to signing Shevchenko for West Ham in 1994.

He replied: “What happened? Me and Frank Lampard Sr, who was my assistant at the time.

“He knew a couple of lads, he was a lad from Canning Town, we got a phone call from a couple of lads.

“They were good guys in the East End and did a lot of business in Russia and Ukraine.

“And they said, 'look, we can get any player' – there were no foreign players here – 'the best players to look out for'.

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“They sent two players and we arranged a match with Barnet's reserves. Shevchenko scored two goals and we liked him, but he cost around a million pounds.”

“I remember talking to Frank afterwards and saying, 'That's too much money.' I was only 17 or 18.

“We didn't catch him, but I got a call a few years later, those guys: 'Is that Harry the judge?'

“They called me and beat me up for not wearing it!”

And rightly so, 'Arry' Shevchenko would go on to become one of the best strikers of his generation.

AC Milan eventually took a chance on the Ukrainian in 1999, paying Dynamo Kiev a whopping £21.5m for the striker, slightly more than the £1m West Ham had initially considered five years earlier.

And it was money well spent by the Italian side, where he scored 29 times in his debut campaign and a total of 173 times in 296 appearances over seven years.

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His goals led AC Milan to Champions League glory in 2003 before leading them to Serie A success the following year, winning the Golden Ball in the process.

Perhaps the best compliment would be the fact that Shevchenko would still rank head and shoulders above some of football's greatest legends.

While he could have called Marco Boogers and Iain Dowie teammates, he ended up playing alongside Paolo Maldini, Clarence Seedorf and Andrea Pirlo, among many other talented stars.

And while they were winning the Champions League, West Ham were suffering relegation from the Premier League.

Perhaps the wise Redknapp had foresight beyond his years, though, as Shevchenko eventually ended up in England when Chelsea broke the English transfer record by signing him in 2006 for £30.8m.

Considered a breakthrough move for the Blues at the time, Shevchenko never really settled in London and struggled to score goals, netting just nine times in the Premier League across two seasons.

This led to the once-great striker being deemed surplus to requirements in 2008 by then-manager Luiz Felipe Scolari, eventually returning to AC Milan on loan after just two years at Stamford Bridge before completing a permanent transfer back to Dynamo Kyiv the following summer.

So maybe Harry was right all along.