What happened to star signings your club never made?
BBC Sport looks back at high-profile transfer targets that clubs pursued but ultimately failed to sign, contrasting how those players' careers unfolded afterwards. The piece opens with Tottenham's failed 2023 move for Nigerian striker Gift Orban, illustrating how such near-misses can go on to have very different trajectories, some fading and others flourishing elsewhere.
Orban, then 21 and prolific for Gent, was touted as a replacement for Harry Kane, but Spurs balked at a £25m fee and the deal collapsed; he has since had four clubs and struggled to rediscover his best form. The article also revisits Manchester City's stunning £108m offer for Kaka in January 2009, rejected by the Brazilian, who later joined Real Madrid for £56m, and Bolton Wanderers' 2004 approach for World Cup winner Rivaldo under Sam Allardyce, showing how missed signings can end in decline, glory elsewhere, or deals that never materialised at all.
- BBC Sport revisits big transfer targets clubs failed to sign.
- Tottenham's 2023 Gift Orban pursuit collapsed over a £25m fee.
- Man City missed Kaka in 2009; Bolton pursued Rivaldo in 2004.
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Missed transfer targets are a familiar part of football folklore: for every star a club successfully signs, there is usually a list of players they tried and failed to land. This piece looks back at some of those near-misses, tracing what happened to the players afterwards once the move fell through.
The starting example is Gift Orban, a young Nigerian striker who Tottenham considered as a potential Harry Kane replacement in 2023 but did not sign because of the fee involved. Other cases include Brazilian playmaker Kaka, who turned down a huge offer from Manchester City in 2009 before later moving to Real Madrid, and World Cup winner Rivaldo, who was linked with a surprising move to Bolton Wanderers in 2004.
The wider point of the article is that failed transfers do not all end the same way, some players struggle afterwards, others go on to further success elsewhere, and some deals were never close to happening at all. It offers a light look at what-might-have-been moments in football, rather than reporting on any single current transfer.