NEW YORK, July 30 (STATS Perform/dpa/EP) –
FC Barcelona player Robert Lewandowski accused Bayern Munich on Saturday of lying and inventing “nonsense” about his departure from the German club, while denying that his departure was related to a hypothetical arrival of Erling Haaland to the Bavarian team.
Barca paid Bayern €45m to sign Lewandowski after only one year remained on his contract and the player made clear his desire to leave following a breakdown in extension talks.
According to statements to ESPN collected by Europa Press, the Pole denied wanting to leave due to the interest of the Bundesliga champions in Erling Haaland, who ended up changing Borussia Dortmund for Manchester City.
“No, it had nothing to do with Erling (Haaland),” he told ESPN FC. “I’m a guy that even if something doesn’t do me good, the truth is more important. I don’t want to talk about what exactly happened. But if the question is whether the decision to leave was for him, no, I didn’t see the problem if he came to the Bayern,” he insisted.
Thus, the striker stressed that in Bayern “some people” did not tell him “the truth”. “For me, it was always important to be clear, to be faithful, and maybe for some people that was the problem. In the end, I know something was wrong with me… And I felt that maybe it was a good time to leave Bayern. and sign for Barcelona,” he explained.
“I feel like I’m in the right position, in the right place. So everything that happened in the last few weeks before I left Bayern, of course, was also a lot of politics. The club tried to find an argument so that they could sell me to another club, because it was difficult to explain to the fans. I had to accept that, although a lot of nonsense was said about me,” lamented the footballer.
Finally, Lewandowski stressed that the club’s words “were not true.” “But in the end I knew that the fans, even in that period, are still very supportive of me,” he said.