Speaking on The Diary Of A CEO podcast with Steven Bartlett, the 31-year-old Portugal international described a transfer that reached the point of personal agreement before collapsing entirely due to his club's refusal to sell.
"Yeah, I spoke with Tottenham, and we were very close to getting an agreement done," Fernandes said. "Then, in the last two days of the market, Sporting just said, 'We're not going to sell him. We're going to keep him because we need him.'"
Fernandes was candid about how badly he wanted to go. The Premier League had been the target. The club, ultimately, was secondary.
"Obviously, I was lucky enough that my dream club to play in England was Man United, and obviously, Tottenham at the time was the option I had, and I was very, very happy to join them because they showed me the process that they were going through."
Sporting's decision was driven by valuation rather than sentiment. The club's president, Frederico Varandas, subsequently confirmed that Tottenham's offer — a fee of around €45 million with a further €20 million in performance bonuses including a Premier League title bonus — fell short of what the Portuguese club felt the midfielder was worth. Sporting rejected the bid and Fernandes stayed.
His reaction at the time was not concealed. In past interviews, Fernandes admitted he was "really angry" with the club's decision, having had his sights firmly set on the move.
The episode also illuminated a lesser-known chapter from earlier in the same podcast appearance. Fernandes recalled that his career could have taken a drastically different path in 2013, when he was a teenager at Udinese and came within hours of being sent on loan to Watford — then owned by the same family group — during the final days of a transfer window.
The sporting director called him to a hotel to pack his things. He packed. Then the call came: the loan was off. The manager had decided to keep him. The message relayed was straightforward — the coach loved his attitude, wanted him to learn, and was convinced he would succeed at the club.
Eventually, United came calling and the deal was done for £67.6 million. Six years on from the Tottenham near-miss, Fernandes has won the Europa League, a League Cup and an FA Cup with United, and long since become the first name on the team sheet under a succession of managers.
The podcast appearance offered a rare look at the contingency of a career that changed shape in the final hours of a transfer window — and at how differently English football history might have read had Sporting decided to negotiate.