Despite the frankly ridiculous common narrative among casual fans that Borussia Dortmund happily let Bayern Munich take their biggest stars, Bayern has not signed one of Dortmund’s players since 2016, when the Bavarian giants picked up their former youth player, Mats Hummels, with just one year left on his contract.
Exploiting these contractual situations was always crucial to Bayern poaching Dortmund’s best players, whether it was Hummels and Robert Lewandowski’s expiring contracts or the release clause in Mario Götze’s contract. But Dortmund have grown more powerful financially over the years and made exploiting contracts much harder for the Bavarians.
That might change now, though. Florian Plettenberg reports that Bayern have Borussia Dortmund’s Raphael Guerreiro “on their list”. The Portuguese player’s contract is expiring this summer, making him a financially attractive option. In fact, talks apparently “took place in the last weeks” as Bayern is aware that he will leave Dortmund in the summer. Plettenberg even reports “that the progress [over a move to Munich] went well.”
However, in the wake of CEO Oliver Kahn and sporting director Hasan “Brazzo” Salihamidžić being fired, it is unclear, as many things are in Munich nowadays, if the new board would approve of the signing. It would be an especially painful transfer for Dortmund, though, seeing Bayern take a regular starter from the club so soon after the Bavarians barely pipped them to the title.
Guerreiro has made a name at Dortmund by playing on the left side, but has found a new lease of life this season following a switch to the midfield. Would Guerreiro be the new midfield signing the bosses are looking for? Would Guerreiro be a backup to or even supplant Alphonso Davies, considering the recent uncertainty over a new contract for the Canadian? These are yet more questions that follow Bayern during these uncertain times.