The top 10 biggest rejected bids in football history after Real Madrid’s Julian Alvarez move | OneFootball

The amount of money being spent on transfers in recent years has become ridiculous – and Real Madrid, Liverpool and Barcelona have all had eye-watering offers rejected.

So powerful are some clubs these days that they have been able to reject nine-figure offers for their most coveted players.

We’ve pulled together the 10 highest rejected bids in football history.

10. Kaka to Man City (2009, £100m)

Looking to make the most of their newfound riches half a year after pulling off the audacious signing of Robinho, Man City held serious talks over what would have been an even more eye-catching Brazilian swoop.

2007 Ballon d’Or winner Kaka was the subject of their attention in the January 2009 transfer window and they were willing to more than double the world transfer record at the time by putting together a £100m package.

But talks ended as Kaka decided to stay at Milan rather than join a City side stuck in the bottom half of the Premier League. Fair enough.

On the same day they backed out of their Kaka pursuit, City announced the signing of Craig Bellamy, as if merely to highlight how weird and wonderful their early transfer windows post-takeover were.

At the end of the season he moved to Real Madrid instead (that’s Kaka, not Bellamy…), briefly becoming the most expensive signing in history until they snapped up Cristiano Ronaldo for an even bigger fee in the same summer.

But the £56m price Madrid paid for Kaka was significantly less than what City were offering half a year before.

Kaka explained seven years later: “I’d absolutely no idea that City were interested in signing me until they’d actually made their official offer to Milan. They had gone straight to Milan.

“I came to the conclusion that it was not quite the right time for me to go to City, and the main reason was the uncertainty over the squad-building process.

“It wasn’t clear to me how the squad would be reshaped and I wasn’t convinced it would work. I was being asked to swap one of the most historic and successful clubs in Europe for a team who were only at the beginning of a new project, where I was supposed to be the first big player. It was safer to stay at Milan.”

9. Harry Kane to Man City (2021, £100m)

After saying goodbye to Sergio Aguero in 2021, City began their search for an elite new striker and tested Tottenham’s resolve over Kane.

On the back of seven consecutive seasons hitting double figures of goals, Kane was believed to have told Spurs he wanted to leave, which encouraged City to make their move.

City put £100m on the table and suggested to Spurs that they could also include players in the deal, but Daniel Levy was having none of it.

Pep Guardiola explained: “We tried [for Kane] but it was far away [from] being done because Tottenham were clear this is not going to happen. And when they say this two, three, four times, it’s over.”

The next summer, City signed Erling Haaland instead – a decent alternative, to be fair – and a year after that, Kane was finally sold by Spurs to Bayern Munich.

Bayern broke their transfer record to sign Kane, but denied some reports exaggerating the value of their successful bid, which they insisted was £82m.

8. Alexander Isak to Liverpool (2025, £110m)

Liverpool eventually got their hands on Isak last summer, but boy did Newcastle make them work for it.

A couple of weeks after signing Hugo Ekitike, himself a former Newcastle target, Liverpool caught everyone by surprise by launching their bid for Isak as well.

It had already been known that Isak was someone they wanted, but they weren’t expected to make a move for him after getting Ekitike through the door.

Newcastle were not to be moved at first. Liverpool’s opening gambit was for £110m plus add-ons – still not enough to satisfy the Magpies.

“I was made aware that there was a bid – that bid was turned down all before I even heard about it,” Eddie Howe explained.

But Newcastle buckled eventually and accepted a deadline-day offer for Isak worth a British record £125m.

7. Philippe Coutinho to Barcelona (2017, £119m)

Barcelona became enamoured by Coutinho after his rise to prominence as one of the Premier League’s best playmakers with Liverpool.

They opened the bidding at £72m, but Liverpool said no. Boosted by the funds raised from Neymar’s move to PSG, Barca came back at £90m, only to be turned away again. Then they upped the ante and tabled a £119m bid.

Still, Liverpool resisted. And so they got to enjoy a few months of having the ‘Fab Four’: Coutinho, Sadio Mane, Roberto Firmino and recent signing Mohamed Salah.

Barcelona came back for Coutinho in January 2018 and this time got their man, only after being squeezed to £142m.

And after all that effort, Coutinho turned out to be a big flop in La Liga, only ever scoring 17 goals from 72 games in the Spanish top-flight.

6. Neymar to Barcelona (2019, £120.5m plus three players)

Two years after Neymar’s earth-shattering move from Barcelona to PSG, which smashed the world transfer record and had a huge ripple effect on the market, there was an attempt by the Catalan giants to take him back.

Barca made a written offer of £107m plus £13.5m in bonuses, plus three players – which PSG requested to be Jean-Clair Todibo, Ivan Rakitic and a certain Ousmane Dembele.

Of course, Dembele has since gone on to become a PSG player – and a Ballon d’Or-winning one at that – but back then he was reluctant to make the move.

PSG were reluctant about the whole thing too, ultimately moving the goalposts after settling on the make-up of the add-ons and deciding they’d prefer a bigger up-front fee.

Barca weren’t willing to go any further and their quest to get the MSN band back together ended there.

5. Julian Alvarez to Real Madrid (2026, £129m)

Florentino Perez got minds racing when he made the bold promise of making Real Madrid’s biggest ever transfer offer in the build-up to his re-election as president.

“I’m going to make an offer to a major Champions League club for a great player,” he said on Spanish TV. “It would be the largest transfer fee Real Madrid has ever paid in its history.”

After denying the €150m player was either Michael Olise or Erling Haaland, Perez offered some more clues: it was an attacker, not from the Premier League.

Following his re-election, Perez’s words were put to the test. A ‘Comunicado Oficial’ on Real Madrid’s website revealed all.

“Real Madrid C. F. announces that, following the meeting of the Board of Directors held today, it has made an offer of 150 million euros to Club Atletico de Madrid for the federative rights of the player Julian Alvarez.

“After reviewing and evaluating the offer, Club Atletico de Madrid has expressed its gratitude for the proposal, made within the framework of the good relations between both clubs, and has rejected it, referring to the player’s release clause.”

The prospect of poaching Alvarez from their city rivals hadn’t really crossed the minds of many. The Argentine striker was, though, known to be a big target for Barcelona.

Whether Madrid had any intention of actually signing Alvarez or it was all just bluster designed to shake the ground at two of their rivals – more so Barca – is up for debate.

4. Mohamed Salah to Al-Ittihad (2023, £150m)

2023 was the year the Saudi Pro League really ramped up its aggressive recruitment drive, starting with the capture of Cristiano Ronaldo.

By the end of the summer transfer window, a huge offer was submitted for the league’s dream target, Mohamed Salah of Liverpool.

The bid was reportedly worth more than £100m, rising to £150m in add-ons. But coming so late in the window, it wasn’t even considered by Liverpool.

Fast forward a few years and Salah could finally end up in the Saudi Pro League, with Liverpool letting him walk free after a fractious final season.

Whether that would make them regret turning down £150m for his services though is up for question, especially after his huge contributions to their Premier League title win in 2024-25.

3. Kylian Mbappe to Real Madrid (2021, £171.7m)

Real Madrid’s long-term dream target, Mbappe was the subject of a series of huge bids towards the end of the 2021 summer transfer window.

The first was worth £137m, which prompted PSG’s sporting director Leonardo to respond: “We consider the offer as being very far from what Kylian is worth today.”

A second bid totalled £146m and was again turned down, before a last-ditch final offer worth almost £172m on deadline day.

But PSG did not even respond to that third offer. Tic Tac. At the end of the season, they tied Mbappe down to a new contract until 2024.

Given Mbappe’s previous push to leave the club, it came as a surprise. Ultimately, he ran down his deal in Paris to join Madrid as a free agent.

2. Lionel Messi to Inter Milan (2006, £225m)

How different things might have been.

In 2020, Joan Laporta revealed ahead of his return to power as president an old tale of fending off interest from elsewhere in Messi.

The story was from 2006. According to Laporta, Inter wanted to pay €250m for Messi – who was still a teenager at the time – but the Barcelona chief sent them packing.

It was just as well. Messi became Barca’s record scorer and a multiple Ballon d’Or winner, ultimately staying with the club until 2021.

But just imagine. €250m would be a record-breaking transfer even now. Had it gone through 20 years ago, it would have been absolutely mind-blowing.

Maybe it could have helped ease Barca’s future financial issues. But the benefit of having Messi for 17 years probably outweighs everything.

1. Kylian Mbappe to Al Hilal (2023, £259m)

A year after signing his last PSG contract, Mbappe was once again the subject of a ridiculous bid, this time from Al Hilal in the Saudi Pro League.

The proposal was worth a whopping €300m, which equated to around £259m. And with it becoming increasingly clear that Mbappe was looking to walk away the following year, PSG were open to doing business.

But Mbappe himself had no interest in a move to Saudi Arabia, with his heart set on Real Madrid as his next destination.

Thus, Al Hilal’s attempt to sign Mbappe fell apart. A year later, he completed one of the most high-profile free transfers of all time instead.