Kylian Mbappé in a Liverpool shirt has always felt like one of those transfer stories that existed mainly in newspaper headlines. His name was linked with Anfield repeatedly over the years, particularly whenever his future at Paris Saint-Germain became uncertain, but Real Madrid gradually emerged as the obvious destination if he ever decided to leave Paris. What Mbappé has now revealed is that there was a time when Liverpool were not simply monitoring him or appearing on a list of possible destinations. They had a genuine chance to sign him.
That moment came in 2017, when Mbappé was still an 18-year-old at Monaco. Liverpool held serious discussions with his family, Jürgen Klopp personally met the player aboard a private jet and Mbappé’s mother, Fayza Lamari, travelled to Liverpool to see the club and Anfield for herself. She returned convinced that her son should move to Merseyside. Mbappé was interested too, but ultimately chose Paris Saint-Germain for a reason Liverpool could do very little about: before leaving France, he wanted the opportunity to become a star in his home city.
Liverpool’s interest went far beyond a transfer enquiry
By the summer of 2017, almost every major European club knew about Mbappé. His breakthrough season at Monaco had produced 26 goals in all competitions and helped Leonardo Jardim’s young side win Ligue 1 ahead of PSG while also reaching the Champions League semi-finals. At 18, he had gone from academy prospect to perhaps the most valuable teenager in world football, attracting interest from Real Madrid, PSG and several Premier League clubs.
Liverpool were among the serious contenders. Their interest progressed considerably further than the enquiries and informal conversations that surround most major transfers. Klopp met Mbappé and his family personally as Liverpool attempted to convince them that Anfield should be the next stage of his career, with considerable effort made to keep the discussions away from public attention.
Klopp has since revealed that one of those meetings took place aboard a private jet. The aircraft remained in the air while they talked and ate together because the discussions were supposed to remain secret. Mbappé’s latest account confirms that the meeting was not simply Liverpool trying their luck with a player destined to go elsewhere. He has described himself as having been close to joining the club and recalled Klopp’s pitch positively, suggesting Liverpool were a genuine option alongside PSG and Real Madrid.
Why Mbappé’s mother wanted him to join Liverpool
Liverpool also had an influential supporter inside Mbappé’s family. Fayza Lamari, who has played a major role in managing her son’s career, admired Klopp and believed Liverpool offered an excellent environment for an 18-year-old still developing his game. Rather than judging the club only from negotiations, she travelled to Merseyside herself to get a better understanding of what life there might look like.
Lamari visited Liverpool, went to Anfield and attended matches without her son. Mbappé has explained that she wanted to experience the atmosphere and understand the club before the family made such an important decision. She liked what she found and subsequently encouraged him to choose Liverpool, particularly because of the opportunity to work with Klopp.
Mbappé himself did not need much convincing about the stature of Liverpool or the quality of their manager. His hesitation was not based on doubts about the club. The more important question was whether he was ready to leave France at all, and on that point he reached a different conclusion from his mother.
Why Mbappé chose PSG instead
Mbappé was born in Paris and grew up in Bondy, on the north-eastern outskirts of the capital. After emerging at Monaco, he felt that moving directly abroad would mean leaving France without ever having played for the club of his home city. PSG could offer Champions League football, enormous ambition and a squad filled with established stars while also allowing him to return home.
That combination proved decisive. Mbappé joined PSG initially on loan in August 2017, with the transfer becoming permanent the following year for around €180 million. He remained there for seven seasons, became the club’s all-time leading scorer and eventually moved to Real Madrid in 2024.
Looking back, Mbappé does not portray Liverpool as a club he rejected because their project was inferior. He has instead described a choice between several excellent possibilities, each offering something different at a crucial stage of his career. Liverpool had Klopp and a rapidly improving team; Real Madrid represented the club he had dreamed about as a child; PSG gave him the chance to become the leading French player in Paris before eventually moving abroad. At 18, that final argument proved the strongest.
What could Mbappé have become in Klopp’s Liverpool?
The timing makes the story particularly fascinating in retrospect because Liverpool were about to assemble one of the best attacking units in Europe. Mohamed Salah arrived from Roma in the same summer, joining Roberto Firmino and Sadio Mané in a front line that would become the foundation of Klopp’s most successful side. Liverpool reached the Champions League final in Mbappé’s first season at PSG, won the competition a year later and ended their 30-year wait for an English league title in 2020.
Mbappé’s qualities at Monaco already looked unusually well suited to Klopp’s football. He was devastating when attacking space, exceptionally quick in transition and increasingly clinical in front of goal. Placing that version of Mbappé into a Liverpool team built around pressing, rapid counter-attacks and forwards constantly exchanging positions produces an obvious footballing hypothetical, although it would be too simplistic to assume Liverpool could simply have added him to the Salah-Mané-Firmino trio without changing anything else.
The financial commitment required to sign Mbappé could have affected other recruitment, while Salah’s role — or perhaps even his transfer — might have developed differently. Later deals for players such as Virgil van Dijk and Alisson Becker also formed crucial parts of Liverpool’s rise, and a huge investment in Mbappé would inevitably have influenced the club’s spending elsewhere. What makes the story interesting is therefore not the fantasy of inserting all four attackers into the same XI, but the fact that two careers about to transform European football briefly came close to developing together.
Liverpool’s later links with Mbappé were different
Mbappé continued to be linked with Liverpool throughout his years at PSG, particularly whenever negotiations over a new contract stalled or the possibility of a move to Real Madrid resurfaced. Those stories were often treated as a continuation of Liverpool’s original pursuit, but the circumstances were completely different.
In 2017, Liverpool were negotiating for an exceptionally talented teenager whose future was still open. Within a few years Mbappé had become one of the highest-paid and most commercially valuable players in football, and any attempt to sign him would have required a financial package on a completely different scale. Liverpool could credibly compete for the Monaco player by selling him a sporting project and the opportunity to develop under Klopp; competing for the established PSG superstar was a far more complicated proposition.
Mbappé himself has effectively drawn the same distinction. When discussing Liverpool now, he points back to the Monaco period as the moment when a transfer was genuinely possible. His admiration for Klopp remained and the two continued to speak warmly about each other, but the later Liverpool links never appear to have reached the same stage as those original discussions.
The outcome worked well enough for everyone involved. Liverpool became Premier League and European champions under Klopp without Mbappé, while the Frenchman became PSG’s record scorer, won the World Cup with France and eventually completed his long-awaited move to Real Madrid. Yet the new details make the 2017 story far more significant than an old transfer rumour. Liverpool had secured the meeting, Klopp had impressed the family, Mbappé was seriously considering the move and his mother actively wanted him to choose Anfield.
In the end, Liverpool were not beaten by a better sales pitch from another English club or by Mbappé deciding that Klopp’s project was not ambitious enough. They were competing against the attraction of home. At 18, Mbappé decided that before leaving France for one of Europe’s giants, he wanted to become the biggest footballer in Paris first.
Published by Patrick Jane
24.09.2026