A Look Back On Some Crazy Transfer Window Stories

On July 24th 2013, Arsenal Football Club made an audacious bid to lure Luis Suarez away from rivals Liverpool by triggering the buy out clause that existed in his contract.

The brain trust at the Emirates decided to bid £1 above that buy out clause offering an official bid of £40,000,001 prompting an amazing response from Liverpool owner John Henry.

They were up to their old tricks recently, offering a derisory £40 million for Crystal Palace’s Wilfried Zaha. We take a look back at some of the strangest transfer window stories.

1. Zlatan Ibrahimovic

Since we already mentioned Arsenal doing something insane in the transfer market let’s revisit them. Arsene Wenger has spoken many times about the players he ‘almost’ signed for Arsenal and that list includes Zlatan Ibrahimovic. Zlatan, who was a teenager at the time, refused to take part in a trial, insisting he was good enough to go straight into the Arsenal team. Wenger didn’t think so and sent him on his way. Even as a teenager Zlatan was Zlatan.

2. David De Gea

Fax machines. Who still uses fax machines? Thankfully for Manchester United the world of tranfers still runs on them. David De Gea was all set for a move back to his home city to join Real Madrid when a malfunctioning fax machine meant that ‘Dave Stayed’ and Keylor Navas could unpack his bags back in Madrid.

3. Robert Lewandowski

A fax machine prevented David De Gea from moving to Real Madrid but a volcanic eruption prevented what would have been one of the signings of the century! Robert Lewandowski was all set to sign for Blackburn Rovers for £4m before an Icelandic volcanic ash cloud prevented him from travelling to sign for Sam Allardyce. He signed for Borussia Dortmund instead and lived happily ever after.

4. Peter Odemwingie

No list of odd transfer stories could exist with out Peter Odemwingie and his car. Odemwingie left the West Brom training ground convinced his move to QPR had gone through. The only problem was Junior Hoillet had refused to move in the opposite direction so the move fell through. Odemwingie was unaware of this development when he turned up to the training ground expecting to be a QPR player.

5. Ali Dia

We’ve all been there. Our teams have signed a new player that we know nothing about and we’re gripped by expectation and hope that this unheralded player could be a world beater. Southampton must have thought when they signed Ali Dia, George Weah’s “cousin”, that they were onto a winner. Of course he wasn’t a world beater, he wasn’t even George Weah’s cousin. He made his debut off the bench for Graeme Souness and was then hauled off after 53 minutes and never played for them again.