Lionel Messi snubbed enormous £220m offer from Manchester City
According to revealing new reports from The Daily Express, during the peak of the political crisis surrounding Catalonia, Pep Guardiola and Manchester City did, in fact, try to lure Lionel Messi out of Spain.
The report suggests that Guardiola, who oversaw Messi's tremendous growth at Barcelona, made a "serious approach" to sign the Argentine sensation.
City were reportedly willing to dig deep and pay a staggering fee of £220 million to make the move happen. Additionally, Messi's father would have reportedly received £44 million. Further, Messi himself would've earned £220m as salary over the duration of 5 years.
However, Messi refused to indulge the now defending Premier League champions and opted to remain at Barcelona before eventually signing a new contract by the end of 2017.