Former Arsenal vice-chairman David Dein has opened up on how close Arsene Wenger came to signing Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo when they were teenagers.
Speaking at the London Palladium via the Evening Standard, the ex-Gunners chief revealed that signing the former FC Barcelona star was a non-starter. With Messi extending his contract with the Catalan giants as soon as Wenger caught wind of the Argentine’s talents.
As for Ronaldo, though, Dein says that he and Wenger sat down with the Portuguese star’s agent over a potential transfer. However, Manchester United snapped up the attacker soon after their meeting with the forward.
As we know, both players went on to define an era of football. With Messi and Ronaldo winning 11 Ballon d’Or’s between them and establishing themselves as two of the greatest players in the history of football.
And according to Dein, Ronaldo could have been an Arsenal player had the club acted sooner. Wenger’s former partner in crime said: “He was spotted by our chief scout.
“Arsene said: ‘Look, do you want to go over and see him play?’ I said: ‘Yeah sure, I’ll go across’. Then the agent, who was with us at the time, said: ‘Well, believe it or not, he is going to meet us for dinner afterwards’”.
Dein later added: “The following day I was discussing with the agent, and about six hours later, Manchester United blew us out of the water.”
Arsenal could have been a different beast with Messi and Ronaldo
Wenger missing out on players such as Messi and Ronaldo is perhaps not surprising. After all, the former Arsenal manager is famous for knowing about a talent before they explode onto the scene, with similar cases happening for Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Yaya Toure and Kylian Mbappe.
Yet Messi and Ronaldo would have been two players who could have transformed Arsenal from the Invincible years into different titans in their own right. But as we know, football has its funny ways of working out. And Wenger missed out on both names.
Receive exclusive football transfer news and updates twice a week to your mailbox
