Marseille president Vincent Labrune has confirmed he did indeed make an approach to convince Jurgen Klopp to take over at the Stade Velodrome earlier this summer as he did not want to be "stupid".
The French giants were left looking for a new coach following the shock resignation of Marcelo Bielsa and, despite fielding a whole host of applications, Labrune first turned to Klopp.
But the German, who is now regularly being linked with taking over at Liverpool, knocked Marseille back.
Nevertheless, Labrune feels with a coach of Klopp's quality out of work, he had to try.
"Within 24 hours of Marcelo's departure I had 40 coaches offering themselves. I gave myself ten days to find the right person", Labrune told L'Equipe.
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"In order not to die feeling stupid though, my preferred choice was Jurgen Klopp. But he declined."
Marseille eventually opted for Michel, the former Real Madrid midfielder who counts Getafe, Sevilla and Olympiacos amongst his previous managerial stints.
The south coast giants currently sit 14th in Ligue 1 with eight points from seven matches so far and are next in action later today when they take on Angers at home.
