Could Haaland snub Man City to succeed Lewandowski at Bayern?

FT Desk

• Updated: 16 Mar 2022 14:28 GMT
• 3 min read

Manchester City and Real Madrid remain the favourites to sign Erling Haaland from Borussia Dortmund, but with Robert Lewandowski yet to extend his contract, Bayern Munich are keen to snatch the Norwegian.

City have reportedly offered Haaland £500,000 per week to join them this summer - a budget outside of Bayern's pay structure - but with Lewandowski's future at the Allianz Arena uncertain, the Bavarians are doing all they can to persuade the young striker to join them instead.

Lewandowski's Bayern contract runs until the summer of 2023, but it wasn't until February that sporting director Hasan Salihamidzic publicly asserted that the club wanted to extend his deal.

Lewandowski unimpressed

"I'm hearing that for the first time," said Lewandowski ahead of Bayern's 1-0 win over Eintracht Frankfurt - a rare blank for the Pole who has now scored 43 goals in all competitions.

Lewandowski remains a world class striker, but at 33 Bayern are understandably planning for the future, and Jan Age Fjortoft, a Haaland confident, says that Haaland is their Plan A.

"As I found out: Robert Lewandowski would like to leave Bayern, he would like a big time move," he explained to Sky Germany. "The replacement for Robert Lewandowski is Erling Haaland. They're now trying everything to get Erling Haaland. Very, very intensely."

Haaland has a €75m release clause at Dortmund, and although Bayern are loathe to spend big in the transfer market, they did spend five more than that on Lucas Hernandez just three seasons ago.

Spending such a budget on Haaland's arrival rather than Lewandowski's salary deep into his 30s seems a likely tactic from Bayern. Thiago Alcantara and David Alaba have been allowed to depart on free transfers for Liverpool and Real Madrid in recent seasons, and former CEO Uli Hoeness even described the latter as a "greedy piranha."

Goal-greedy Haaland has scored 23 times in 21 games this season. Whether he wants to solve Bayern's Lewandowski dilemma rather Manchester City's remains to be seen.