Barcelona have a history of pinching some of Liverpool’s best players over the years.
Indeed, some of Liverpool’s very best players have swapped Anfield for Camp Nou in the past.
Luis Suarez, Philippe Coutinho and Javier Mascherano all left Merseyside for Catalonia, and, back in 1997, another of Liverpool’s star players almost made the same move.
Speaking on the Aldo Meets Podcast, Steve McManaman has claimed that Liverpool accepted a £12m from Barcelona to sign him in 1997.
However the winger didn’t have any interest in heading to Barcelona at that point, claiming that it was a non-starter.
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Liverpool accepted Barcelona bid for Steve McManaman
McManaman spoke about how Barcelona tried to sign him from Liverpool.
The winger says that this deal wasn’t necessarily ever close, but a bid was accepted at one point.
McManaman was an ‘incredible’ player for Liverpool with Robbie Fowler naming McManaman as his greatest teammate ever.
“You know, obviously you leave in 1999, but back in 97, there was a lot of talk about you potentially going to Barcelona. How close did that come to fruition?” McManaman was asked.
“Well, it wasn’t that close, to be honest, on my part. It was Liverpool had accepted the fee for me.”
“Was that 12 million?” The host asked.
“Yes, I believe. And then they told me about two weeks later that they’d accepted the fee. And I could talk to Barcelona.
“But when I spoke to Barcelona almost on the telephone, it wasn’t, it was a non-starter really. We were nowhere near doing anything. And I was surprised because I said, because then it was like a bit of a PR exercise that it was me against the club and I wanted to leave.”
“And I said, you know, and again, I was great with Evo at the time. It was probably the boards because they’d accepted a load of money for me without me knowing. And so I was, of course, I was disappointed about that.”
What Steve McManaman said about Trent Alexander-Arnold’s potential Real Madrid move
McManaman would snub Barcelona, refusing to kickstart a trend that would later be followed by Suarez, Mascherano and Coutinho.
However, McManaman did start another worrying trend at Anfield in 1999 as he headed to Real Madrid.
McManaman was the first Liverpool player to swap Anfield for the Bernabeu, but he certainly wasn’t the last.
Indeed, a number of big name players have moved from Liverpool to Madrid over the years, but it was McManaman who first trod that path.
| Liverpool players who joined Real Madrid | Year joined |
|---|---|
| 1999 | |
| Michael Owen | 2004 |
| Jerzy Dudek | 2006 |
| Xabi Alonso | 2009 |
| Alvaro Arbeloa | 2009 |
Of course, this is currently a big talking point at Anfield as Trent Alexander-Arnold has been linked to Real Madrid in recent times, and there are certainly echoes of McManaman’s move in that deal.
However, according to McManaman, Alexander-Arnold’s situation is different due to Liverpool’s current stature and the Champions League format.
“There’s certain parallels, it’s different now. He’s won every trophy manageable with Liverpool. When I joined Madrid, because of the format of the league, the way it was situated, I hadn’t played in the Champions League,” McManaman said.
“It wasn’t the first four places, the first five places, possibly the first six places next year. It wasn’t that. Everybody’s played in the Champions League now, if you play for one of the top clubs, because you have that opportunity to do that.
“I didn’t, so it was the Champions then, and possibly the team that finished second later on when I was at Liverpool. And we finished third, so I hadn’t played in the Champions League, which is I wanted to play against the best. That is different now.”
McManaman knows what it means to swap Liverpool for Real Madrid, but whether or not Alexander-Arnold opts to make that same move remains to be seen.
