Former Reading FC manager and head of football Mark Bowen has revealed that Manchester City once ‘accidentally’ submitted a bid for Lionel Messi during his time at the club.
Bowen first joined Reading as technical director in 2019 before being promoted to the club’s sporting director. A controversial appointment saw him replace Jose Gomes as the club’s new first-team manager in October 2019. He departed Reading in August 2020, but then returned to the club as head of football operations in May 2022 before leaving in September 2024.
Before his time with Reading, Bowen was an assistant manager under Mark Hughes at several clubs, including Manchester CIty.
According to Bowen, who was assistant manager at Man City from June 2008- December 2009, the club made an accidental bid for Barcelona star Messi.
Having just been taken over by Sheikh Mansour and with hundreds of millions of pounds at their disposal to splash to try and become one of the big dogs in Europe, City looked to make a statement signing.
Speaking on the Business of Sport podcast, Bowen said: “At one point we were making random €30million offers for Berbatov, Robinho, Ribery. We were circulating them around Europe to see who would accept.
“While all this was unfolding, during an event in London, the Barcelona president announced that Manchester City had made a €30million offer for Messi.
“While all of this was going on, at an event in London, somebody, probably Gary Cook, said ‘Jesus Christ, this is getting messy,’ so somebody has literally sent an offer to Barcelona for Lionel Messi.
““The (Barcelona) president has come back and gone, ‘Who do you think you are? You think you can buy Lionel Messi off us? No chance. Please back away,” Bowen explained. “All because somebody in the office heard, ‘we think this is messy.’”
