Radamel Falcao Was Offered to Aston Villa for £5M, but Boss Signed Emile Heskey

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Football transfers are a tricky and imprecise business, and sometimes managers, in hindsight, get them very, very wrong.

As the dust settles on Radamel Falcao joining Manchester United, per the club's official Twitter, we were reminded of the time he almost ended up in the Premier League—with Aston Villa.

Back in 2008, the then-unheralded Falcao was offered to Martin O'Neill on the cheap. But he went for a tried-and-tested Premier League player instead, according to Gregg Evans of the Birmingham Mail:

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In 2008, Villa manager Martin O’Neill was offered a little-known Colombian prospect by the name of Radamel Falcao for a fee reportedly around £5M, but he chose to sign Wigan Athletic’s Emile Heskey instead.

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Heskey was signed by Villa in January of 2009. He's not the only Colombian the Premier League missed out on. It was reported earlier this summer that Manchester United had been offered James Rodriguez, only to sign Bebe instead.

[H/T Reddit]