Jurgen Klopp's Near-Miss with Mbappe: A €500m Transfer That Didn't Happen
Jurgen Klopp stood on the sideline in Foxborough and watched France’s stars go through their warm-up. No technical area, no roaring Kop behind him, just a television gantry and a heavy heart. When Kylian Mbappe finished the quarter-final against Morocco, the former Liverpool manager made his way over, shared a brief reunion with his old transfer obsession, then lifted an arm to acknowledge the forward’s mother in the stands.
It was a small gesture, but it dragged Klopp straight back to one of the great “what ifs” of his career.
Years earlier, he had tried – and failed – to bring Mbappe, Ousmane Dembele and Adrien Rabiot to Anfield. Three talks, three near-misses, three ghosts that still follow him. Speaking in his role as a MagentaTV expert, Klopp did not bother to hide the sting.
“It’s extremely tough for me right now,” he admitted. “I’ve already negotiated with three of their players and never got them.”
For Mbappe, Liverpool went all in. Klopp pulled back the curtain on an extraordinary undercover operation in 2017, a pursuit that sounded more like a spy thriller than a transfer pitch.
With Monaco’s teenage phenomenon on the brink of a decision, Liverpool chartered a private jet from Blackpool to Nice. Secrecy was everything. No leaks, no airport photos, no whispers to tip off rivals. Just Klopp, his staff, and a plan to convince the most coveted youngster in Europe to pick Merseyside over the bright lights of Paris.
“With Mbappe, it was before he went to Paris,” Klopp recalled. “That was roughly €500 million, the most expensive non-transfer we’ve ever made.”
“We flew from Blackpool to Nice. In Nice, the whole Mbappe family boarded a private jet with five cabins. Then we flew around in circles and had a delicious meal. We weren’t allowed to be seen. It was great – and then he went to Paris.”
The image is almost surreal: a manager and a prodigy, high above the French coast, circling in the sky, sharing food and ideas while trying to stay invisible. Liverpool rolled out discretion and charm. Mbappe chose Paris Saint-Germain and a €180 million move.
Liverpool were left with a story and a bill for a plane. Mbappe left with the weight of a superclub on his shoulders.
His years in France brought goals, titles, and a constant swirl of tension. Internal rivalries with Lionel Messi and Neymar cut into the image of a seamless super-team, the politics at PSG often as prominent as the football. The superstar who seemed destined to dominate the Champions League is still waiting to lift it, even after his switch to Real Madrid.
The narrative in this version of events is brutal. PSG, in the time since his departure, have gone on to win the Champions League twice in two years. Mbappe, now 27 and the face of Real Madrid, is still chasing the trophy that defines European greatness.
Klopp, meanwhile, has stepped away from the Anfield dugout, his decision to leave Liverpool in 2024 closing a transformative era. For now, he is enjoying the relative calm of punditry, trading touchline chaos for studio lights and touchscreens. But this is an interlude, not an epilogue.
The 59-year-old is poised for the next great job of his career, lined up to replace Julian Nagelsmann as Germany’s national team coach once the major tournament in the United States comes to an end. The man who once flew in circles over Nice for a teenager’s signature is about to inherit a generation of them at international level.
Mbappe’s focus, though, is fixed firmly on the present. His goal against Morocco has driven Les Bleus into the semi-finals, another step in a tournament that feels tailored to his sense of occasion. He leads the line, carries the expectation, and chases the glory that still eludes him at club level.
On the touchline in Foxborough, as Klopp waved towards Mbappe’s mother and shared a moment with the player he never signed, the subtext was impossible to ignore. One man is between jobs, about to take charge of a nation. The other is at the peak of his powers, still hunting the one club trophy that keeps slipping away.
They crossed paths again, not in a boardroom or on a private jet, but on the edge of a pitch in America. The transfer never happened. The story clearly never left either of them.
