Barcelona manager Enric Masip has suggested that Paris Saint-Germain was the club that offered 250 million euros ($263.9 million) for teenage striker Lamine Yamal last summer.
Barça president Joan Laporta revealed in October that LaLiga officials rejected the huge offer for the 17-year-old, but did not confirm where the offer came from.
“The president has already said that there was an offer of 250 million euros that was rejected and not even considered,” Masip, who is part of the club's sports commission and advises Laporta, told El Chiringuito.
“Wine from France.”
PSG lost striker Kylian Mbappé to Real Madrid last summer, which meant they were searching the market for potential replacements for the French international.
Asked if PSG were the club in question and whether Yamal would have been the perfect replacement for Mbappé, Masip added: “When you have money to spend, you can aspire to try to sign whoever you want.”
Mbappé's arrival in Spain was supposed to take Madrid to the next level, but the LaLiga and European champions' attack has been overshadowed by Barça's trio of Yamal, Raphinha and Robert Lewandowski so far this season.
Yamal has scored six goals and provided eight more assists in 16 games in all competitions, and Barça lost the only two league games in which he did not start.
“I would say that right now he is the most decisive player [in the world]Yes,” Masip said when asked if Yamal is currently the best in the world.
“I don't think it's necessarily good to talk about a 17-year-old being the best in the world, but for us it is.
“I wouldn't say that we won the lottery, but the year in which Mbappé decided to go to Madrid, which was the icing on the cake for a team that had won LaLiga and the Champions League, you have a 16-year-old boy who wins the Euro Cup [with Spain] and becomes a global phenomenon in a very short time.
“Suddenly you are in a league that starts as Mbappé's league and becomes the league of [Yamal] with the way he shows up and plays in such a fun way, he's a different player.
“What Vinícius Júnior can do, Mbappé can do, players with speed, with that quality… what Lamine does is something you saw in [Lionel] Messi, something different.
“Every game he does something that leaves you with your mouth open. It is a privilege for LaLiga and Barça to have a player like that.”
Yamal missed Barça's last game before the international break, a loss to Real Sociedad, with a sprained ankle, which also forced him to miss Spain's victories over Denmark and Switzerland this week.
He is in a race against time to be fit for Saturday's visit to Celta Vigo, and then Barça will play Brest in the Champions League on November 26.
