Liverpool and Barcelona Win Battles for Barcola and Gordon

Bayern Munich spent the summer looking for wingers with star power. They ended it watching two of their prime targets unveiled elsewhere.

Bradley Barcola to Liverpool for £123 million.

Anthony Gordon to Barcelona for £69m.

Two statement deals that underlined the financial reality even a giant like Bayern now has to respect.

Eberl’s long courtship of Barcola

For Max Eberl, Barcola was not a name plucked from a scouting database. This was a long-running pursuit.

"To be honest, I already know Bradley from my time at Leipzig. I wanted to bring him to Leipzig," the Bayern sporting director told Sport Bild. Those early conversations mattered. "We sat down together and discussed it back then. That’s how I developed a closer relationship with Bradley. So there was always interest there. Of course, we also looked into him at Bayern."

The admiration never faded. The price changed everything.

Liverpool, searching for a successor to Mohamed Salah after his glittering nine-year spell at Anfield, pushed their chips into the middle. They made Barcola their priority, outmuscling Arsenal and anyone else in the queue. The winger, already a two-time Champions League winner with Paris Saint-Germain, wanted the move. The numbers soared.

"When you hear about sums like that, it was too much for us," Eberl admitted when asked about Liverpool’s £123m outlay. He pointed to Bayern’s own big decision this summer: "With Luis Diaz, we made a decision that was also costly, but on a different scale than Bradley."

Liverpool were willing to live at that scale. Bayern were not.

Barcola’s fee makes him the second-most expensive signing in Liverpool’s history, behind club-record arrival Alexander Isak. That’s the financial bracket Bayern chose to walk away from.

Gordon: another target priced out

On the other flank, the story repeated itself.

"It’s no secret that we were interested in Anthony Gordon for the left wing," Eberl said. Bayern had clearly identified the Newcastle forward as a natural fit for Vincent Kompany’s wide areas: direct, aggressive, Premier League-hardened.

The outcome felt familiar.

"We decided we were not doing that because he was simply too expensive."

Barcelona stepped in, closed the deal at £69m and handed Bayern a second reminder of the new market reality. Two elite wingers, two heavyweight auctions, no Bayern signature on either contract.

Bayern’s reset: exits and a different kind of rebuild

Missing out on Barcola and Gordon did not leave Bayern frozen. It forced a different type of rebuild.

With Ismael Saibari and Nathaniel Brown coming through the door, the club then moved firmly into balancing-the-books mode. Joao Palhinha, Alexander Nubel, Daniel Peretz, Noel Aseko, Jonah Kusi-Asare, Maurice Krattenmacher, and Lovro Zvornarek all departed the Allianz Arena.

It was a clear shift. Instead of one blockbuster winger on Premier League-style wages, Bayern spread their resources, trimmed the squad and backed Kompany to mould a leaner group.

The message from Eberl was unmistakable: Bayern will still spend, but not at any price.

Barcola’s first steps in red

While Bayern recalibrate, Barcola has already started to write his next chapter on Merseyside.

Andoni Iraola eased him in. A 60th-minute debut off the bench, replacing fellow new signing Victor Munoz, in a 2-0 away win at Ipswich. Enough time for a few touches, a few sprints, a first taste of English football’s tempo.

His first start came on a bigger stage: the Champions League, under the Anfield lights, against Diego Simeone’s Atletico Madrid. The type of game Liverpool usually reserve for players they trust.

Barcola did not dominate, but he did not hide either. He showed the sharp movements and quick feet that convinced Liverpool to commit £123m. He stretched Atletico’s back line, looked to combine, asked questions.

Then the body reminded everyone this is still prelude, not peak. Cramp forced him off shortly after Alexis Mac Allister struck the decisive second-half goal in a 2-1 win. Iraola now has to manage his minutes, his adaptation, his rhythm.

Liverpool, though, have what they wanted: a high-ceiling winger in Salah’s old territory, already bedding into a new system, already feeling the weight of expectation.

Bayern chose a different path. Liverpool and Barcelona chose to pay the premium. The season will reveal who read the market – and the moment – better.