Scott Minto: 'I was crying when I started writing my letter explaining why I was leaving Charlton Athletic - I loved the club but didn't think we would reach the Premier League'

Former defender's pride at his Addicks upbringing and how Keith Peacock played a role in his transfer to Chelsea

When Scott Minto reminisces about leaving Charlton Athletic, it underlines just how much the club meant to him.

He was 22 at the time. His transfer to Chelsea for an initial £775,000, in May 1994, had taken him to one of the biggest clubs in England on a three-year contract.

There was every reason for Minto, capped by England at U21 level, to be overjoyed. And yet he vividly recalls being in tears when he wrote a letter to then Charlton chairman Richard Murray explaining his decision to go.

Scott Minto playing for Charlton/Picture: Tom Morris

“I left purely because I didn’t think Charlton would get into the Premier League,” Minto told South London Sport: Charlton Athletic Edition. “I was playing really well and coming to the end of my contract.

“Curbs (Alan Curbishley, joint-manager with Steve Gritt) says he doesn’t remember it, but they called me in for contract negotiations. Curbs said a figure, I won’t say what it was, and I said: ‘Curbs, if you’ll offer me that then I’ll sign.”

‘Okay, leave it with me.’

“He came back about a month later and they offered me £50 a week more! I was on a contract that I signed when I was 19, so it wasn’t a lot of money at all. Apparently I gave them a look, without saying anything, and then said: ‘Is that it?’

“I walked out, not in a rude way, but I think they understood. Either Rob Lee or Browny (Steve Brown) said to me: ‘They didn’t want you to stay because they needed the money’.