Top five football superstars who almost signed for ISL clubs

ISL had garnered interest from some of the top footballers in the world.

The Indian Super League (ISL) has brought a sense of extravaganza to Indian football in terms of attracting notable foreign players in its history. In the initial years of the competition, the clubs were encouraged to splurge big money to bring some well-known foreign players to raise the overall popularity of the league.

Even if some of these footballers were close to retirement or well past their best, the presence of ‘marquee players’ like Alessandro Del Piero, Robert Pires and Roberto Carlos in the initial years was enough to excite fans. However, it’s not the case that all such foreign players were eager to join an ISL club to get an experience of Indian football or simply as a way of earning more money.

There have been quite a few instances when footballers who looked possible to join an ISL club had their links crushed in the end. Here, we look at the five foreign footballers who were supposed to join ISL clubs, only for the moves not to materialise.

5. Mario Balotelli

Mario Balotelli is definitely one of the most controversial footballers of the 21st century, being known for his stints at Inter Milan and Manchester City. The Italian forward won the Premier League title with the Cityzens and was especially excellent in Euro 2012, but his disciplinary issues have caused his career to dwindle into obscurity. In 2024, however, Balotelli was actually linked with a stunning possible move to Kerala Blasters in the ISL.

The Italian’s agents reportedly met with the ISL club’s representatives over a deal, and he was open to a stint in Indian football. However, this move couldn’t ever transpire. The Blasters’ management felt that Balotelli wouldn’t fit their wage budget, and his disciplinary problems in the past also spooked them. If things had gone differently, then maybe the Italian bad boy could’ve tormented ISL defenders in the 2024-25 season!

4. Rickie Lambert

Rickie Lambert will probably be remembered by Premier League fans for his excellent rise with Southampton in the early 2010s, before his corresponding move to Liverpool. A clinical forward, Lambert’s heroics in the 2013/14 season, in which he scored 13 goals and provided 10 assists in the Premier League, even earned the Englishman a place in the 2014 FIFA World Cup squad for England. However, Lambert’s career went downhill with a move to Liverpool, for whom he only scored two goals in the Premier League.

It turns out that Kerala Blasters tried their hand at potentially bringing Lambert to Indian football in 2017. Soon after he was released by Cardiff City at the end of the 2016-17 season, Lambert attracted the Tuskers’ attention. However, the Englishman eventually opted against making a move to Indian football and ultimately retired from football in October 2017.

3. Stiliyan Petrov

Stiliyan Petrov is a bona fide legend for Bulgarian football, being Bulgaria’s highest-capped player of all time with 105 appearances for them. He had a memorable stint with Celtic in the early 2000s before joining Aston Villa in 2016.

Petrov earned the reputation of being a hard-working and gritty midfielder who loved winning duels and troubling teams. He had a battle with leukaemia in 2012, being able to get rid of the disease before also going into remission soon after. Aston Villa helped him through his troubles, but he was let go by the club in 2013, after which he retired from football.

However, after beating leukaemia again, Petrov returned to football in 2017 and even practised with the Villans. In 2017, he claimed to have received an offer from an ISL club that wanted him to make his return to football in India. However, despite having the chance to play in the ISL, the Bulgarian midfielder ultimately turned it down, as he didn’t want that experience in his late 30s.

2. Julio Baptista

A multi-time Copa America winner with Brazil and having also won La Liga with Real Madrid, Julio Baptista entertained the fans as a hard-working and explosive midfielder in the 2000s.

However, he was troubled by certain issues after leaving AS Roma in 2011, going on to spend stints at clubs like Malaga, Cruzeiro and Orlando City. The Brazilian midfielder actually had the chance to play for Kerala Blasters in 2017, at a point when he was a free agent after leaving Orlando City.

Kerala Blasters felt that a player of his stature and physical profile could take the ISL by storm and deliver a lot of goals for them to help the Tuskers win the title.

However, as Baptista was in negotiations with Bolton Wanderers at the time, he opted to reject the move to Indian football. Ultimately, the English side didn’t sign him either, causing frustrations for Baptista and Kerala Blasters as well.

1. Andrea Pirlo

Andrea Pirlo is widely considered one of the greatest midfielders to come out of Italian football, and he enjoyed a legendary career spanning over two decades. Pirlo enjoyed success with both AC Milan and Juventus, winning six Serie A titles and also the UEFA Champions League twice.

He personified a classy midfielder, having utmost flair on the ball and exceptional technical qualities that saw him dominate many midfielders and also win the FIFA World Cup with Italy in 2006. It turns out that an unspecified ISL club actually tried its best to sign Andrea Pirlo for the second edition of the league in 2015.

Pirlo had just left Juventus and was reportedly open to the idea of playing in the ISL but had to reject advances from the club because of the salary cap set by the ISL. Had there been no cap, then Indian football fans could’ve seen Pirlo grace Indian football with his magic before he joined New York City FC for the last few years of his career.

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