RB Leipzig star Josko Gvardiol had the mother of all sliding door moments when he was a teenager.
The Croatia defender was getting fed up with a lack of opportunities in the Dinamo Zagreb youth team.
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The pathway to becoming a professional footballer became increasingly unclear – and another career was tempting him.
Gvardiol’s father is a fish monger and the centre-back grew up helping him at the market.
Less than five years ago, the 21-year-old was considering a lifetime of 4am starts to sell fish in Zagreb.
Now, he is on the verge of joining champions of Europe Manchester City and becoming the most expensive defender in the history of football.
talkSPORT understands City have agreed a £77million fee to sign Gvardiol from RB Leipzig this summer.
Add-ons are expected to tip the deal over £80m, surpassing the record amount Manchester United paid for a defender when they signed Harry Maguire in 2019.
As life-changing decisions go, Gvardiol’s was a pretty good one.
He told the Times in February: “I was 16 or 17 and still on the bench in the youth teams. I was frustrated and, at one moment, I was thinking to leave football.
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“By the way, I hate fish. Imagine being 16 years old and there’s only fish to eat every day at home. I want to try something else.
“I don’t know what happened but then afterwards I started to play and they finally saw something in me, my quality, and in one year I moved to Dinamo Zagreb’s second team.
“In six months I was in the first team with [now-RB Leipzig team-mate] Dani Olmo.”
Things escalated pretty quickly for Gvardiol after that as well.
After one season in Zagreb’s first team, RB Leipzig swooped in to sign him ahead of Leeds, who had just been promoted to the Premier League.
Gvardiol said: “I had two options, Leeds and Leipzig. Bielsa was the coach and my goal in my career is to play in the Premier League.
“[But] I knew I needed to take a few steps more before I get there one day.”
Leeds weren’t the only Premier League side who tried and failed to bring the Croatian to England until now.
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Gvardiol rose to fame at the 2022 World Cup, starring for Croatia as they reached the semi-finals.
Lionel Messi gave him the run-around during a 3-0 victory for Argentina – but that did not damage his ever-growing reputation.
Chelsea made a £70m bid as part of their January spending spree – and Gvardiol wanted the move.
He recalled: “My agent called me and saw that Chelsea is extremely interested. Of course you definitely think about a serious offer from a huge club like Chelsea.
“Leipzig said they didn’t want to sell me, in the end I really struggled with that decision but we didn’t make an agreement.”
RIght now, it looks like avoiding Chelsea was as lucky as choosing football over fish mongering.
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