Kevin De Bruyne slipped through FC Bayern’s fingers in 2015. According to a former Man City player, Pep Guardiola had a hand in this.
Did Pep Guardiola deliberately prevent the transfer of Kevin De Bruyne when he was Bayern coach? Former Man City player Fernandinho put forward this theory on the Denilson Show podcast.
Fernandinho played together with De Bruyne at Manchester City under Guardiola until 2022.
„He was at Bayern and De Bruyne was at Wolfsburg,“ the Brazilian said of the former FCB coach: „Bayern’s scouting department says: ‚We’re looking at this boy, what do you think about bringing him to us? And Pep says: ‚No, no, no, I don’t want him, I don’t think he’ll fit into our team‘.“
Guardiola is said to have rejected De Bruyne. According to Fernandinho, this was done with an ulterior motive, as he continued: „A year goes by, De Bruyne goes to ManCity. Another year goes by, Guardiola joins City. Do you understand? The guy knew he was going to City and sent De Bruyne ahead.“
De Bruyne transfer apparently fell through due to transfer fee
However, the statements of all those involved speak against Fernandinho’s theory.
FC Bayern were in fact interested in signing De Bruyne. The attacking midfielder had just led VfL Wolfsburg to the runners-up spot and DFB Cup victory in 2015.
However, the record champions‘ efforts failed at the time due to money. „FC Bayern didn’t want to pay a large sum for him. They couldn’t do that. Everything we did in Munich was in agreement,“ explained Pep Guardiola back in 2017.
This is in line with the statements of Patrick De Koster, De Bruyne’s advisor. He told the Belgian sports magazine Le Vif in 2016 that Bayern had agreed a transfer with the player, but did not want to pay more than 50 million euros.
Manchester City, on the other hand, offered 76 million euros and signed the Belgian at the end of 2015, marking the beginning of a success story. Today, the 32-year-old is still one of the key players under Pep Guardiola.
