One that got away 🤦‍♂️: Neymar to Bayern Munich | OneFootball

Cast your mind back to May 2013.

Bayern Munich have just won the treble and Pep Guardiola is coming in to replace Jupp Heynckes as head coach. World domination is on the cards.

Guardiola, fresh from a year-long sabbatical, only has two big transfer requests. Thiago, for his midfield, and Neymar.

“Guardiola had certain ideas about a young Brazilian player,” ex-Bayern president Uli Hoeneß confirmed in 2016.

“But in the past things hadn’t gone so well for us with young Brazilians.

“When you then go and get one who costs €20m or €30m or more, it can be very difficult. We experienced that with Breno.”

So Hoeneß and Bayern pursued Mario Götze, who they described as a “similar type of player” instead. And they got him.

But things could have been oh so different. Neymar’s agent at the time has since confirmed that Bayern made an offer, but the Brazilian went to Barcelona for an incredible €88m fee and Götze completed his move to Bayern.

Neymar went on to score 105 times in 186 appearances for Barça, winning the Champions League once, LaLiga twice, and the Copa del Rey three times before a world record €222m move to PSG in 2017.

As for Bayern, well, the task to replace legendary wingers Franck Ribéry and Arjen Robben is still huge. Serge Gnabry has done very well and Kingsley Coman is bright when fit, but it’s not quite enough and the team remains reliant on a number of older players like Thomas Müller (30) and Robert Lewandowski (31).

Under Guardiola, the German giants reached the Champions League semi-finals in three consecutive seasons but didn’t have enough to go one step further.

You can’t help but feel Neymar could’ve changed that. Especially against Atlético Madrid in 2016, when only the away goals rule denied the Bundesliga champions a place in the final.

Had Neymar pushed for a move – either to PSG (as he did) or one of the two biggest clubs in Spain – Bayern would have almost certainly collected a world record fee.

That money could have done wonders as the club looked to push on in the post-Pep era.

It just wasn’t to be.