According to media reports, Bundesliga club FC Bayern is working on a commitment from central defender Matthijs de Ligt. Munich were already after the Dutchman three years ago, but then Cristiano Ronaldo of all people intervened.
Throwback: In the summer of 2019, Matthijs de Ligt was one of the hottest stocks in football. The Ajax defender had received the coveted “Golden Boy” award the year before and was already wearing the captain’s armband in Amsterdam at the age of 18. At the time, half of Europe was interested in the central defender, including the German industry leader.
Ultimately, however, the Italian record champions Juventus were awarded the contract, 85.5 million euros migrated to the Netherlands as a transfer fee. At Juve he signed a contract until 2024 which made him one of the best paid players in the squad.
His former teammate Heiko Westermann has now revealed which detail may have been the deciding factor for de Ligt to move to Italy. “I would have liked to have seen him in the Bundesliga back then. Bayern would be the right club for him. I said that back then, but Cristiano intervened,” Westermann said in an interview with “sports1“.
Westermann: De Ligt “absolutely deserves” the move to Bayern Munich
Because: Cristiano Ronaldo, who played for the “Old Lady” between 2018 and 2021, had approached Matthijs de Ligt during an international match between Portugal and Holland and made a move to Juve palatable. The defender later told this anecdote himself. According to Westermann, that encounter actually influenced de Ligt’s decision significantly.
Former Hamburg player Heiko Westermann played alongside the defender in the 2016/17 season. The 38-year-old still advocates a transfer to Bayern, albeit belatedly: “Matthijs absolutely deserves to be able to make the step to Bayern now because he’s a good boy.”
Westermann still remembers the time together in Amsterdam well. It was “predictable pretty quickly” that de Ligt would prevail in the competition between the two, “because he had developed brutally”. Nevertheless, the former central defender supported the youngster: “I liked taking care of Matthijs and supporting him. Every now and then I brought him home because he didn’t have a driver’s license yet. I just liked him.”