John Stones, on paper, isn’t anything we haven’t seen before: A tall, 21-year-old English defender who’s good on the ball with a handful of England appearances to his name.

Ordinarily, Stones is the kind of player Chelsea, which won the Premier League last season, would be interested in, but its pursuit has been hastened by the need to replace the team’s 34-year-old talisman, John Terry. And so, Chelsea unsuccessfully submitted three separate bids for Stones — £20million, £26million and £30million. Earlier this week, in an effort to force through the move, Stones submitted a formal transfer request to Everton.

Everton’s response to Chelsea’s interest has been rather indignant. Martinez rejected all three bids outright, claiming Chelsea were being “disrespectful” in its pursuit of his player, and doubled-down on those claims on Wednesday:

“His request will be rejected. I have not spoken about it until now because we have been preparing for a match but we need to set an example for other clubs. Money cannot buy everything in football. Players are human and they deserve to be able to consider the next move in their careers but we are attempting to build the club and get to a Wembley final.”

While Martinez is on a crusade to hold people to his romantic ideal, he’s forgetting the reality in front of him: Not since 1995 has Everton won a trophy, and last year the club finished in 11th place. If the team puts together a good season this year, they’ll do well to finish sixth.

Martinez said in the above quote that he’s trying to “build a club” that can “get” to a cup final. At Chelsea, John Stones has an extraordinary opportunity to learn from the man who some consider among best English defenders ever, under the tutelage of the best defensive manager in the world, fighting to build a dynasty.

The last time Everton were in a situation like this, the club sold Wayne Rooney to Manchester United and reinvested the funds to bolster its squad, lifting them from perpetual relegation-fighters into a secure spot in the top half.

Everton may remain intransigent about it all, but if they do, Chelsea will probably just buy a cheaper Spanish defender instead. But what, then, if Stones remains unhappy? Or gets injured? Or rather simply fails to fulfill his potential? If any of those things happen, Everton won’t have to worry about how to reinvest £40million to make them better than they would have been. They’ll be facing an entirely new set of circumstances altogether, armed only with the memory of an supreme opportunity missed.