AS football transfers go, very few require a transatlantic sea voyage — let alone the help of a Titanic expert.
But then not all acquisitions are plain sailing, particularly when they involve heavy timber doors from an iconic stadium.
The tale of Wembley’s Royal Tunnel Gates — made famous by many an FA Cup final broadcast — is almost as extraordinary as the feats they witnessed in 77 years at the Home of Football.
When the old stadium locked the gates for the final time in 2000, no one could have predicted they would escape demolition by a whisker and end up on the other side of the world in Chile.
Yet, 7,000 miles away, they reside, painstakingly preserved in the Fundacion Museo de la Moda, Santiago de Chile — one of the few remaining relics from a sporting colosseum that still turns fans misty-eyed.
Not that their journey was simple or certain.
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The gates date back to 1923, when Wembley was built, and formed the entrance in front of the Twin Towers where royalty such as King George V and Queen Elizabeth II passed through to witness showpiece matches, including the White Horse Final and 1966 World Cup finals.
When the bulldozers moved in at the turn of this century, they were just two days away from destruction.
That was until The Brooking Trust, an architectural charity, came to the rescue and took them to Greenwich with the intention of displaying them.
However, the size of the gates — each weighs a ton and measures five metres in height and width — meant the trust ran out of room and they were eventually put up for auction in 2011.
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Enter an unlikely saviour in Chilean businessman Jorge Yarur Bascunan. Fascinated by Wembley and with his country having hosted a World Cup four years prior to England in 1962, he paid £5,875 at Sotheby’s.
And that assured a future for the legendary gates at his museum, the Fundacion Museo de la Moda, Santiago de Chile, where he serves as president, founder and director.
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Acacia Echazarreta, the museum’s head of collections, explained: “The decision was motivated by their historical and symbolic value as a cultural icon of the 20th century, rather than by a purely sporting interest.
“Football is also the most popular sport in Chile and the history of Wembley has a special resonance for Chilean audiences.
“The Chilean national team achieved one of its most memorable victories there in 1998 — defeating England 2–0 with both goals from Marcelo Salas.
“And, in 2013, Alexis Sanchez also scored twice in another Chilean victory against England.
“These moments created a lasting emotional connection between Chilean football and the legendary stadium, giving the acquisition of the gates an additional layer of national and cultural significance.”
The colossal doors were shipped to Chile by sea, where they arrived at the port of San Antonio before being transported inland to Santiago.
However, time spent in customs, along with humidity and excessive heat, resulted in degradation, wood rot and fungal attack and the fate of the gates was still far from certain.
Cue the arrival of a Titanic expert.
In March 2014, French specialist Stephane Pennec — renowned for restoring artefacts from the world’s most famous cruise liner — was enlisted by the museum to save the gates, along with a team of conservationists.
Echazarreta said: “The gates arrived showing damage caused by transport and age, including fungal attacks, oxidation and structural deterioration.
“The intervention, directed by Stephane Pennec, restored material stability and visual legibility to a heritage object of great symbolic value and ensured its long-term preservation, integrating the gates definitively into the foundation’s historical and sporting collection.”
With the work complete, the gates were finally put on display at the museum the same year, with the backdrop of the Andes replacing their traditional view of Wembley Way.
They are currently housed in controlled conservational conditions awaiting future exhibition.
Sadly, very little else remains of the old Wembley.
The Twin Towers are controversially long gone, their rubble buried under mounds at Northala Fields in West London.
A lone flagpole holder from the East Tower sits nestled in Brent River Park, a mile away from the new Wembley, and the flagpoles themselves are housed on Sir William McAlpine’s Fawley Hill estate, complete with the famous crowns on top.
But despite other artefacts in museums, nothing is quite as unique as the story behind the Royal Tunnel Gates in Santiago — a fact not lost on the Fundacion Museo de la Moda, Santiago de Chile..
Echazarreta added: “The institution regards these gates as an exceptional historical testimony, given that in the United Kingdom no material remains of the original Wembley Stadium have survived.
“For the Fundacion Museo de la Moda, Santiago de Chile, preserving them in Chile is a source of pride and a heritage responsibility.
“It safeguards one of the few tangible remnants of the most iconic stadium in the history of world football.
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“These gates are just an exceptional architectural testimony through which figures such as King George V and Queen Elizabeth II passed over nearly 80 years of the stadium’s history.
“The institution recognises their exceptional historical and heritage value and considers their future presentation a cultural priority.”