Bayern Munich tried to sign him for £70m but Nottingham Forest ended up getting him for 23x less

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Nottingham Forest have clearly prioritised bargains in the transfer window recently, but one player could well stand above the rest given how much Bayern Munich were willing to spend on him.

It’s hard to pick out any of the current Forest squad as signings that Evangelos Marinakis overpaid for, with Nuno Espirito Santo’s team of undervalued stars climbing all the way to third in the Premier League table.

Position	Team	Played MP	Won W	Drawn D	Lost L	For GF	Against GA	Diff GD	Points Pts
1	LiverpoolLiverpool	26	18	7	1	62	26	36	61
2	ArsenalArsenal	25	15	8	2	51	22	29	53
3	Nottm ForestNottingham Forest	25	14	5	6	41	29	12	47
4	Man CityManchester City	25	13	5	7	52	35	17	44
5	B’mouthBournemouth	25	12	7	6	44	29	15	43

From back to front there are bargains everywhere, with Matz Sels costing Forest just £6m and becoming the Premier League’s top goalkeeper statistically with his ten clean sheets this season.

In the defence, Forest paid only £14m for Murillo in 2023, with the Brazilian now one of the hottest defensive prospects in Europe leading to Forest demanding a world record fee to sell Murillo should any club ever bid for him.

A bargain deal was also completed in midfield this summer as Marinakis saved Elliot Anderson’s move to Forest from collapsing by managing to offload Odyesseas Vlachodimos to Newcastle in the process, securing an outstanding midfielder for a cut-price deal.

However, one transfer stands above all when comparing their value, mainly due to the staggering fee that Bayern Munich tried to spend on him just a few years prior.

Bayern Munich once tabled a £70m bid for Callum Hudson-Odoi

Looking back, it’s astonishing that Forest paid Chelsea just £3m for Hudson-Odoi given the impact he has had on the team.

Forest fans have demanded Hudson-Odoi get an England call-up to reward his outstanding contributions at the City Ground, but his career was so close to being a very different story.

In 2020, having successfully established himself as a useful member of the Chelsea squad, Hudson-Odoi was the subject of a statement bid from Bayern Munich.

According to a Sky Sports report at the time: “Chelsea [have] rejected a loan bid for Callum Hudson-Odoi from Bayern Munich.

“The [then] Champions League winners have offered to take the 19-year-old on loan for the rest of this season with an option to buy for £70m next summer.”

Whilst this was a shocking amount of money to offer for a player who hadn’t exactly begun to dominate for Chelsea, Bayern’s interest in Hudson-Odoi wasn’t new.

The report continued: “Bayern’s interest in the highly-rated winger is longstanding. They made Hudson-Odoi a key target during the January transfer window last year when they offered Chelsea £30m for his services, and they saw a fourth bid worth around £22.5m rejected in the summer of 2019.”

Hudson-Odoi’s absence was felt in Forest’s loss to Bournemouth but even then, it seems unbelievable to think that the same player Forest bought for £3m was worth 23x more to Bayern just three years prior.

Callum Hudson-Odoi is an even better player today

Continuing with the report, Sky Sports revealed that: “Bayern’s manager Hansi Flick was asked about Hudson-Odoi ahead of his side’s Bundesliga clash with Hertha Berlin on Sunday and confirmed that the club has shown legitimate interest in the player.

“Flick said: “I don’t know what will happen. He’s one of the best talents on his position and can play as a winger and even as a striker. That’s why Bayern Munich is thinking about him.””

Bayern may have missed out on the Englishman when he was younger, but the stats show how much better he has gotten in the years that have passed.

In every metric important to his role other than assists, Hudson-Odoi has become a better player since his move to Forest than when Bayern deemed him worth £70m.

Most impressively, his goalscoring output has improved significantly, alongside his willingness to take a shot on himself based on the increase in shots on target.

Not forgetting his creativity, though, Hudson-Odoi’s dribbling has become more effective to the delight of the Forest manager, who relies on his wingers to supply creativity for Chris Wood up front.

Who knows if Bayern still keep tabs on Hudson-Odoi after all of their failed bids but if they do, they’d be securing a much better player than the one that caught their eye in 2020.