Alexis Sánchez has insisted it was opportunity, and the chance to write history, and not money which made him choose Manchester United over Manchester City.
The Chilean has sat down for an interview with TVN, via La Tercera to discuss his career so far and that inevitably included discussing the Manchester teams.
Sánchez joined Manchester United from Arsenal in a €34m deal in January 2018 after several impressive years with the Gunners in which he scored 80 goals and registered 45 assists in 166 games.
That led both Manchester clubs to chasing his signature and he appeared to be close to joining Manchester City, in a move that would have reunited him with Pep Guardiola, only for that deal to collapse.
Thus, he instead ended up at Manchester United but that move proved to be a disaster, with him managing just five goals and nine assists in 45 games.
The move was naturally criticised as a result, with Sánchez bearing much of the blame given the astronomical wages Manchester United had reportedly agreed to pay him.
The brunt of that criticism was that he had only moved to Old Trafford for the money but he insists that wasn’t the case, particularly as he could have won the Champions League with Manchester City.
“I was about to go to City. I spoke to Guardiola every day, he told me happy birthday. He was like my dad, He was my dad at Barcelona and he was like my dad at City,” La Tercera report him saying.
“We talked, we talked every day, he sent me messages. And everything was ready, there was a player who was going to go to Arsenal. Then Wenger tells me you are not leaving because the other player did not want to come and they do not have another.
“Suddenly the cell phone rings. Mourinho tells me: ‘Alexis, here is the seven available for you.’
“It wasn’t a money thing, so everyone knows. It was the same with United and City. And he said to me here is the seven, we are playing in the Champions League and we are going to give everything. I wanted to leave at that moment, but I had Guardiola’s word.
“That’s when I said to myself, Chilean footballer playing for Manchester United, something that has never happened. With the seven of Cantona, Beckham, Cristiano Ronaldo and now a Chilean had it, it was a dream.
“I don’t regret going to United, things happen for a reason. I would have liked to have gone to City, yes. We would have won the Champions League by now. In the final I would have done something.”
