10 Man Utd Players Who Nearly Signed For Liverpool

6. Dimitar Berbatov

Possessing all the traits of a certain 'King Eric', and having smashed in a match-winning hat-trick against the Reds in 2010, is there any wonder that the Old Trafford faithful lavished the Bulgarian superstar with warmth, praise and adoration? Arriving with a hefty £30 million price tag in 2008, he nonchalantly shrugged it off in typical fashion, as he idly strut around the Old Trafford pitch, banging in goals left, right and centre. However, if Rafa Benitez is to believed, the Anfield club were within a whisker of signing the Bulgarian hot-shot three years prior to his lucrative transfer to Man United. During his first season on Merseyside, the Spaniard was in the middle of master-minding Liverpool's triumphant march to European Cup success, when they lined up a bid for the skilful goal-poacher. With Liverpool having endured something of a striker crisis earlier in the season, with the likes of Neil Mellor, Florent Sinama-Pongolle and Milan Baros amongst their ranks, they were in the market for a marksman. Benitez has intimidated that had Liverpool not been paired off with Bayer Leverkusen in the Champions League last 16, they would have pursued his signature with more vigour.

''We knew about Berbatov before we played them in 2005. I'd been aware of him since I was in Valencia. He was a player we were looking at closely. Everybody can see the quality he has and we wanted him, but then the draw with Leverkusen came along and we couldn't get him. It is a shame but we had to move on.'' - Rafa Benitez, May 2008.