Manchester City were prepared to pay in the region of €100m (£86m) to sign Bayern Munich midfielder Aleksandar Pavlović during the summer transfer window, only for the 22-year-old to turn the move down, according to reports in Germany.
German outlet Bild says City’s interest in the Germany international stretched back several months, with the club’s chase for the youngster beginning well before Enzo Maresca replaced Pep Guardiola as head coach at the Etihad Stadium.
Bild’s head of football, Christian Falk, said City’s willingness to spend such a large sum only for Pavlović to reject them outright had taken the club by surprise.
“You really have to let that sink in. A €100m offer from Manchester City for Pavlović, and the young man says ‘no.’ That’s really impressive. He asked for some time to think it over,” Falk said.
According to Falk, City identified Pavlović as their leading target in his position at an early stage of their planning.
“To our knowledge, the first inquiry was back in March. At that time, he was City’s number one choice for that position,” he added.
Club “flabbergasted” by his decision
Falk went on to describe the reaction inside City’s recruitment department once it became clear Pavlović had no intention of leaving Bavaria, revealing that the Premier League club never even progressed to tabling a formal bid.
“I heard they [Manchester City] were flabbergasted. They didn’t expect that. They probably would have been willing to negotiate a higher amount with Bayern as well. But there wasn’t even an official offer because Pavlović said, ‘No, I’m not coming anyway’,” Falk explained.
The midfielder graduated through Bayern’s academy and broke into the first team in 2023. He has since made 102 appearances for the Bundesliga giants, scoring eight goals and providing six assists, and is tied to the club on a contract running until 2029.
Bayern reporter Julian Agardi, also writing for Bild, said Pavlović’s roots in Munich and his standing in the dressing room made a departure unlikely regardless of the fee on the table.
“Pavlović is from Munich, he was born here. There are photos of him as a little boy in a Bayern Munich jersey. He still makes no secret of the fact that he’s a Bayern fan. And you can tell that every time you talk to him,” Agardi said.
“He also has many good buddies in the dressing room: Tom Bischof, Lennart Karl, Nene Brown. And yet it’s remarkable that he rejected this offer outright.
“That shows that he has absolutely no thoughts of leaving but rather feels completely at home at Bayern and sees his future with the club.”
Part of a wider midfield rebuild
City’s pursuit of Pavlović formed part of a broader plan to refresh their midfield options, with the club having also monitored Barcelona pair Marc Bernal and Ayyoub Bouaddi earlier in the year.
Bouaddi eventually joined from Lille as one of three midfield additions in the summer, alongside Elliot Anderson and Enzo Fernández.
That trio arrived as Maresca began reshaping the squad following his move from Chelsea to succeed Guardiola, but the failure to land Pavlović means City missed out on a player they had tracked since the closing months of the Spaniard’s reign.
Bayern’s decision to hold firm — and Pavlović’s own reluctance to leave the club he supported as a boy — has left City’s midfield rebuild one piece short of where they had hoped it might end up.
