'It was a blessing to have them as my coaches': Whyteleafe to Wembley - this is the making of Calum McFarlane and his team of Chelsea rookies ready to take down Pep Guardiola

First to set the scene. The FA Cup extra preliminary round, the earliest entry point into the world’s oldest cup competition. Glebe from the ninth tier versus Whyteleafe from the eighth. Tuesday, September 1, 2020, lovely night for it at Foxbury Avenue.

Stands do not surround the field. Just wooden fencing – the type you have in your back garden, except these haven’t had a coating of walnut satin in a good while – and a tree line with a few balls wedged within the branches. There are 232 fans in total, including 30 from Whyteleafe, a village near Croydon. Nice numbers in a round reserved only for the lowest reaches of non-League.

Those who made the 30-minute drive from Whyteleafe earn their celebratory McDonald's on the way home. They win 3-1 to continue in the FA Cup, and £1,125 in prize money.

Now to reveal the relevance. Whyteleafe’s manager was Harry Hudson, his assistant was Calum McFarlane, and one of their players was Dan Hogan. Those names will be relevant to Chelsea fans because they are relying on these three English coaches to lift the FA Cup on Saturday.

It is this trio of old pals versus Pep Guardiola, his assistants Pep Lijnders and Kolo Toure, and Manchester City’s army of analysts, in front of the 90,000 souls inside Wembley Stadium.

McFarlane is Chelsea’s 38-year-old interim head coach, Hudson, 37, and Hogan, 28, are his temporary assistants, and their connection is deep. Among the clubs where at least two of them worked together, and sometimes all three, include Whyteleafe, Glebe, Croydon, Sevenoaks Town, and Corinthian-Casuals. They were also coaches for the Kinetic Academy, a football charity co-founded by Hudson in south London aimed at helping underprivileged youths.

There are a number of professional players today who credit McFarlane and Co with having helped them forge their footballing careers, and Courtney Clarke is one of them.

He was 17 years old when he started for Whyteleafe in that FA Cup win over Glebe. Today he is 23 and a wing-back for League Two side Walsall. ‘I never thought I would have such top-level coaches in non-League,’ Clarke tells Daily Mail Sport. ‘I’ve been in the system, and they did way more for me than some did in the professional system. They’re like family to me.’

Clarke had 13 trials in the Premier League and Football League while working with McFarlane and Hudson, before Derby tied him down. ‘I went on trial to Norwich, West Ham, Leicester, Watford… I had interest from Chelsea, Man United, Man City, Fulham, Charlton, Millwall… and I had a young mentality,’ Clarke continues. ‘I thought I had made it because so many teams wanted me.

‘Then there was this game where I didn’t do anything, and I remember, at the end of it, getting shouted at. Because Calum and Harry cared about me so much. I’ll never forget it. I always knew it was a blessing for me to have them as my coaches. They helped me to believe in myself because they believed in me so much. They never let up on me, in the good or the bad. They didn’t let me get complacent. They kept giving me the belief that I could make it.

‘We (Walsall) actually played Chelsea’s Under 21s in the EFL Trophy some months back and I saw Calum because he was still their manager at the time. The way he had Chelsea playing, it was… wow. If it’s not at Chelsea, he’s going to be a top manager somewhere else.’

Hailing from Forest Hill in Lewisham, south-east London, and a family of Chelsea fans, McFarlane’s journey to Wembley has been largely unseen. It started with him dabbling in coaching from 16 years old after coming to the conclusion, as many of us do, that he was not going to make it as a player.

He found youth work at Fulham and Crystal Palace, and it was in 2012, while with youth club Lambeth Tigers, that he happened to coach two Norwegian boys called Tobias and Didrik.

Not yet teenagers, they were the sons of former Tromsø footballer Thomas Hafstad, whose family was spending a year living in London. It was this chance meeting which would see McFarlane, then around 24 years old, relocate to Norway to work for the world's northern-most football club, 217 miles inside the Arctic Circle.

‘My wife, she's a scientist, so she spent a year at King's College London,’ Hafstad, who today serves as the technical director of Tromsø, tells Daily Mail Sport. ‘We lived in Dulwich. We had this connection with Lambeth Tigers, a small club, and that's where I met Calum.

‘Joe Shields (now one of Chelsea’s five sporting directors) was also there. Joe was coaching some sessions with small boys at times but also he had more to do. Calum was the head coach of the Under 11s. Great team. They won all the games.

‘I was Tromsø’s academy manager at the time. At the end of our year in London, I asked Calum if he wanted to join me back to northern Norway, to the Arctic, and he said he wanted to do it! His contribution was to be the main man for our Under 16s but easily we could see, all of us at the club, that he could contribute more. So he moved straight into the Under 19s, and he started taking part in some of the first-team sessions with Tromsø.’

It was an exciting time. They even qualified for the Europa League, where, in 2013-14, they lost 2-0 and 3-0 to Andre Villas-Boas’ Tottenham Hotspur home and away. As Hafstad says, though, it is wintertime in Tromsø for up to six months of the year. The ‘Arctic capital of Norway’ is not for everyone. ‘We are still in touch,’ Hafstad adds. ‘I've visited him at Chelsea. He’s grown up.’

McFarlane moved back to London in 2014 to kickstart his six-year association with Kinetic, where he worked alongside Hudson and Hogan while coaching on the non-League circuit. Hudson previously praised Shields for finding hidden talents locally who would join their sessions, including a 13-year-old Josh Maja, who is now 27, a striker for West Brom, and a Nigeria international.

Seemingly spooked by the online abuse aimed at them – amid accusations that Chelsea have been hiring old buddies from this charity – Kinetic opted not to put anyone forward for interview for this piece. Which is a shame, really, when you would think they want to celebrate having three alumni in an FA Cup final.

To date, Kinetic have seen 83 players sign for professional clubs, and Kwadwo Baah became their 39th when he agreed scholarship terms with Rochdale at the age of 16.

Today he is 23, and a forward for Watford in the Championship. ‘They really helped me, especially when I had one-on-one sessions with them,’ Baah tells Daily Mail Sport on McFarlane and Hudson, having played under the pair at Whyteleafe as well as Kinetic. ‘Both of them have a good heart.

‘I don’t think they look at how badly a kid is behaving. They give the best they can. I knew what they could become in the coaching system. Obviously, they play City in the final, but fingers crossed. It’s good for their careers, especially if they get the win. Who knows, Chelsea could give them the job. It’s a bit optimistic, but it’s how it is in football nowadays. Why not?’

It was in the same month as that FA Cup win over Glebe in September 2020 that McFarlane departed both Whyteleafe and Kinetic because he was moving to Manchester, landing a full-time gig to coach City’s Under 15s. His farewell fixture for Whyteleafe was a 1-0 win over Chichester City in front of 175 fans which maintained their perfect start to the season in the Isthmian League South East Division.

McFarlane was 32 years old, and reunited with Shields, who was City’s head of academy recruitment and talent management and had trust and faith in him.

Working his way up to City’s Under 16s and Under 18s, McFarlane did not get to know Guardiola, nor did he coach Cole Palmer. While McFarlane was treading his own path, so too was Hudson, assisting Brentford’s youth sides before becoming head coach of Wycombe's Under 18s.

Helge Orome is a player care officer in Wycombe’s academy, but he was also Whyteleafe captain when Hudson and McFarlane were his coaches.

‘Where do I start?’ Orome tells Daily Mail Sport. ‘They are probably some of the most important people in my life, I would say, in terms of my career. I had a bit of attention early on, then it didn't pan out the way I expected. H and Cal invested a lot of time in me personally when they didn’t have to. A lot off the pitch. They made me fall in love with the game again.

‘One thing they believed in was if you get the person, you will get the player. Basically that MO is what's got me to where I am today, in terms of football, in terms of the role I have now at Wycombe. It’s all based on the fact that if you get the person first, the player will follow.

‘It’s a beautiful story, inspiring. Even if you aren’t connected to Harry or Calum or Chelsea. We talk about Jamie Vardy going from non-League to winning the Premier League and playing for England. From the coaching side, we all know how tough it is to get in, no matter how good you are. They have built a lot of careers for people that have been mostly overlooked in their lives. They've given countless opportunities to hundreds and hundreds of others. It's about time they got their opportunity as well. They deserve it.’

McFarlane swapped City for Southampton in 2023, first to coach their Under 18s, then their Under 21s. He might have been managing their first team today had he stayed on the south coast, because his successor – Tonda Eckert, the 33-year-old German now embroiled in a 'Spygate' scandal – was promoted from the development side to take over the seniors after Will Still’s sacking.

But McFarlane handed in his notice last summer when his boyhood club called.

Upon joining Chelsea in July 2025, he was appointed head coach of the Under 21s, until Enzo Maresca’s exit on New Year’s Day saw him installed as interim.

John Terry was interested in taking over temporarily, and he does hold a UEFA Pro Licence, but Chelsea’s higher-ups saw a safer bet in McFarlane, who has his A Licence. Not enough of a qualification to allow him to become Chelsea’s full-time manager, but it buys him a maximum of 12 weeks as a caretaker, per the Premier League's rules.

A young father, McFarlane was on his way to the Windsor light show when he got that call. Didn’t even have an access pass to get into all areas of the first-team building at Cobham. Wasn’t sure where he should park his car. Couldn’t waste time worrying with a trip to City in three days’ time.

A 1-1 draw at the Etihad Stadium was highly encouraging. It was his first time managing in a senior match at the age of 37. For Guardiola, it was his 562nd for City, and 1,012th overall. As if it did not already resemble David v Goliath, Moises Caicedo was suspended, Marc Cucurella and Robert Sanchez were injured, and an unwell Wesley Fofana withdrew before kick-off.

The game was not going well, then McFarlane changed Chelsea's shape at half-time, moved to more of a man-to-man system, introduced Andrey Santos into the midfield and pushed Enzo Fernandez up the pitch. Fernandez’s stoppage-time equaliser earned the visitors their point and took two away from City which they wish they had now. Chelsea captain Reece James had to push their tracksuited tactician in front of the away fans to receive his full-time plaudits.

This was enough to earn McFarlane an invitation to join Liam Rosenior’s first-team staff in January as an academy reshuffle saw Hudson take over the Under 21s and Hogan handed the Under 18s.

It was Rosenior’s sacking last month which saw McFarlane made interim again, and we are told one of his first acts was to phone the binned boss, who was said to be supportive of him stepping up while wishing him well.

With Hudson and Hogan by his side, Chelsea beat Leeds 1-0 in the FA Cup semi-finals, and picked up their first Premier League point since March 4 with a 1-1 draw away at Liverpool last weekend, Fernandez scoring yet more significant goals under McFarlane.

McFarlane does not know what will happen this summer. Daily Mail Sport asked him, and he told us he isn’t thinking about it yet, though you wonder whether he now has a taste for management. Chelsea’s owners and directors like him, clearly.

Should the job at BlueCo sister club Strasbourg become available someday, he may find himself a candidate. For now, their next hire – Xabi Alonso, Andoni Iraola, Marco Silva, Oliver Glasner, whoever it will be – could have him stay on their coaching staff.

It is an amusing quirk that by the time his interim spell is over, McFarlane will have managed as many matches at Wembley as at Stamford Bridge, two apiece.

He will walk out of the tunnel and beneath that iconic arch with the possibility of becoming the first English manager to win the FA Cup since Harry Redknapp with Portsmouth in 2008. With the opportunity to secure Chelsea a guaranteed invite into next season’s Europa League. With the chance to have won as many major trophies as Mikel Arteta at Arsenal – for a week or two anyway.

From Whyteleafe to Wembley. It is almost Football Manager made real. A coaching story for the ages if McFarlane, along with Hudson and Hogan, can secure winners’ medals.

One fellow scribe at a national newspaper knows Hudson after growing up nearby, and cannot speak highly enough of him as a person. You get the sense all of Chelsea’s interim coaches are good guys.

It will take greatness to overcome Guardiola’s City, but they will have their supporters across the country, from Clarke and Baah and Orome to everyone else they helped in their years climbing the coaching ladder.

Whatever happens, it will be a day to cherish for the trio and their loved ones, and we will finish with a message which McFarlane’s family kindly sent us to sum up their pride.

‘We’re absolutely delighted for Calum and incredibly proud of everything he has achieved in his coaching career so far,’ they told us. ‘To see him managing in the FA Cup final is such a special moment for all of us and a reflection of the hard work, dedication and passion he has shown throughout his journey.

'As lifelong Chelsea fans, it makes the occasion even more meaningful, and we’ll all be cheering him and the team on every step of the way. We wish him the very best and hope it ends with a Chelsea win!’