Eden Hazard had the chance to wear the Barça jersey but the Catalonian club itself rejected it. This was confirmed several years later by Bojan Krkic SR, who at the time was a scout for the club. In statements to Cadena SER, he explained that, although he thought he was a great player, there were things he didn't like.
"I met Eden Hazard at the European Under-17 Championship. At that time, Belgium and Spain were superior. They reached the finals and Spain won. However, Hazard played wonderfully throughout the tournament except for the final," the former Barça scout began by explaining.
In this sense, "Hazard signed for Lille and I was following him." Bojan continued: "I went to see him in a match in Montpellier. Both teams came out to warm up in August, during a hot day. But one from Lille was missing..."
"After a minute Hazard came on. The team was all warming up together and he was not. Everyone was stretching and he was looking at the stands. He played well in the match but I didn't like his commitment and attitude," Bojan added.
Eden Hazard's attitude didn't stop there, as the former Barça scout added. "I went to see the next game after three days in Lille... against Angers. He was on the bench to rest a little and then they went out to warm up. Everyone was warming up and he was walking."
"The coach was telling him to stretch from afar and he was watching the game," he said. "In the report I wrote "ruled out"... These kinds of top footballers have shown me that they didn't work out well, both when they were my teammates and as a scout for Barça. I ruled him out like that, not because of his quality," he concluded about Eden Hazard.
Eden Hazard: from being Rejected by Barça to Becoming a "godlike" Player for Real Madrid
In 2012, Chelsea paid Lille €40 million to sign Eden Hazard, while in 2019 Real Madrid took him for €120 million.
Barça had him in its sights long before and for much less; but the scouts weren't wrong. They considered him too lazy, despite having enormous quality. That is what happened to him at Real Madrid: Eden Hazard let himself go and failed.
He saved Barça a lot of headaches after having done a good job of monitoring Eden Hazard. That's how it's done.