Report: Bayern Munich’s David Alaba to play out contract

The David Alaba contract extension chronicle has taken more twists and turns than a le Carré novel, but the latest one seems to put everything back to square one. Kicker is reporting that Bayern Munich are perfectly content with letting Alaba play out the rest of his deal and leave on a free transfer in the summer of 2021. Reports vary about how much Bayern is offering vs what Alaba wants in order to remain in Munich, but one thing remains very clear. The two sides are very far apart on wages.

The new bit of news coming from kicker is that Bayern have reportedly not received any transfer requests from other clubs. Usually, when clubs are this far apart on wages or personal terms, the player simply gets sold with no hard feelings from either side. If it’s true that Bayern have received no offers, it could mean a number different things. One, the Alaba camp hasn’t reached out to any other clubs, which would mean they are negotiating in good faith with Bayern. Two, Alaba’s wage demands are scaring off other clubs who don’t want to pay astronomical wages on a left back-but-also-kind-of-a-center back. Or three, every other club sees exactly how this is gonna play out and are waiting until they can snatch him on a free next summer.

It seems odd that the likes of Manchester City, Paris Saint-Germain, Real Madrid or Barcelona would be scared off by a silly thing like wages, but every club has to draw the line somewhere, even the massive ones. This puts option three as the most likely, but most fans would sure like to believe it’s option one and Alaba really does want to stay, and the two sides can hopefully come to terms.