Kylian Mbappe Agreed FC Barcelona Move In 2017 Says Ex-Sports Director

Kylian Mbappe and his father agreed to join FC Barcelona in 2017 according to a former Blaugrana sporting director, who made the claim during an appearance on the highly-popular Spanish TV program El Chiringuito.

Under ex-presidents Sandro Rosell and Josep Bartomeu, Javier Bordas occupied a position now held by Deco during the reign of current Barca chief Joan Laporta.

Next week, the Catalans face Paris Saint-Germain in their first Champions League quarterfinals appearance since 2020.

Many see the tie as evenly-matched, but Mbappe is the potential difference maker capable of breaking Culer hearts.

As Bordas explained, however, Mbappe could have easily ended up on the other side of the ball at the Parc des Princes on Wednesday.

This is because in 2017, when Barca had $240.7 million (€222 million) to spend after PSG triggered Neymar’s release clause and in turn smashed the world transfer record, Bordas reached an agreement with Mbappe and his father for the then-teenager to join the La Liga giants from Monaco.

“If I had been in charge, Mbappe would have played for Barca,” Bordas stated.

Bordas became convinced that the operation was going to be completed only for the coaches and higher ups to overrule him and instead pursue Ousmane Dembele.

Bordas’ fresh comments follow on from him telling the Nude Project podcast last year that he could have signed Mbappe for $108.5 million (€100 million).

“I moved for Mbappe. He could have come to Barca,” Bordas said.

“We didn’t specify a price, but he would have gone for €100 million. The coaches told us that they wanted Dembele because of the other players we had. There was the option to bring both of them.

“Mbappe didn’t want to go to Real Madrid because there was [Gareth] Bale, [Karim] Benzema and Cristiano. Barca went for Dembele and then for [Philippe Coutinho,” Bordas added.

As we are now fully aware, PSG successfully landed Neymar and Mbappe in the same summer while Barca overspent on Dembele, Coutinho and later Antoine Griezmann.

None of those signings proved to be successes and – along with overpaying on new contracts and the effects of the pandemic – contributed to creating a financial crisis for Barca that threw the club to the brink of bankruptcy.

Mbappe punished Barca by dumping them out of the UCL last 16 in 2021, and will now try to repeat that feat alongside Dembele in the quarterfinal this season.

Next term, he is expected to possibly torment Barca further by joining eternal enemies Real Madrid on a free transfer after which he will seek to inflict regular damage in El Clasico.