Bayern Munich tried to sign Arsenal star for crazy fee – Liverpool glad they didn’t

Steve Pearson 10 Sep 2025 10:25 PM

Liverpool head coach Arne Slot and Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta

Fabrizio Romano has revealed the eyebrow-raising sums Bayern Munich tried to sign an Arsenal attacker for in the summer window, and the deal’s failure to get off the ground ensured Liverpool could complete a lucrative move of their own.

The summer window in England has long since closed but snippets of information about what might have been are still coming to light.

When taking to YouTube on Wednesday night, transfer guru, Fabrizio Romano, brought news on how Arsenal and Liverpool’s windows became intertwined.

Bayern Munich pushed to sign a top class left winger after failure to land Florian Wirtz meant an abundance of cash was made available for other positions.

The Bundesliga champions would go on to sign Luis Diaz from Liverpool, but long before the Colombian changed clubs, Bayern wanted Gabriel Martinelli.

However, after reportedly putting numbers in the €30m-€35m bracket on the table, a move was put on ice, with Arsenal believing their Brazilian is worth much more.

After revealing Bayern looked at Lyon’s Malick Fofana too, the trusted reporter added: “Another player that was considered by Bayern for the winger position is Gabriel Martinelli.

“Bayern also spoke to the agents of Martinelli, it was a positive conversation but Martinelli is very happy at Arsenal and Arsenal showed no intention to accept anything close to €30m-€35m.

“For them the player is worth WAY more and this is why the negotiation never advanced. But Martinelli was a serious target for Bayern at the beginning of the summer transfer window.

“Then, again, it didn’t evolve because of financial reasons and also because Martinelli is comfortable at Arsenal.”

Martinelli miss a big bonus for Liverpool

As mentioned, Bayern would go on to sign Diaz for a package worth £65.5m. That represented a significant sum for a player aged 28 and who had made it clear behind the scenes that he wanted out of Anfield.

Diaz did have other suitors, including Barcelona and Al-Nassr. However, Romano touched on Diaz’s situation in his update on YouTube and revealed the Saudi side shelved their plans to sign Diaz in the summer after the change of management (Jorge Jesus replaced Stefanio Pioli as manager in July).

As such, a lucrative sale to Saudi Arabia was removed from the equation for Liverpool. Barcelona favoured Diaz over Marcus Rashford, but the cash-strapped Catalonians could not have come close to matching the £65.5m Bayern put forward.

Accordingly, Martinelli not moving to Bayern indirectly allowed Liverpool to complete their third most expensive sale of all time.

Whether the Reds could have gone on to pay a British record £125m fee (that includes no add-ons) for Alexander Isak without selling Diaz might never be known.

But one thing’s for sure, Diaz’s exit certainly made Liverpool even more determined to land the Swedish striker given their attacking ranks were depleted.