AS Monaco’s CEO, Thiago Scuro, has explained the circumstances behind the club’s decision to cancel Lamine Camara’s transfer to Chelsea and believes Xabi Alonso’s side now risk missing out on signing the Senegal midfielder next year.

After failing with two offers earlier on deadline day, Chelsea finally reached an agreement with Monaco worth €55 million (£47.1m) in the closing stages of the transfer window.

Monaco had also agreed a £40m deal with Everton to sell Folarin Balogun but the Premier League club raised concerns during the striker’s medical which threatened to scupper the move.

Everton eventually decided to push on with their deal to sign Balogun, which then prompted Monaco to pull out of their agreement with Chelsea over their deal for Camara.

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Balogun then opted not to join Everton due to their concerns during his medical and the United States international will remain at Monaco for the time being.

Chelsea are understood to have been furious with Monaco’s conduct but speaking at a press conference on Wednesday, Scuro insisted that the club’s decision to U-turn on their transfer agreement with Camara is ‘part of the game’.

Scuro was also adamant that Camara, who has also attracted interest from Liverpool and Manchester United this summer, ‘will have better options and offers’ next year.

‘Our priority was to keep Lamine in the club, it’s going to be his third season, normally the cycle we do we try to protect our solid performers because the performances are strongly connected to the financial situation of the club as well,’ Scuro said.

‘Clearly, we were open to discussing a transfer for Balogun, he finished his third season, we were already working to replace him, we were fully ready to do this. Things went very well in this strategy until we were almost there.

‘To talk about Lamine, we have been approached by several clubs during the summer, the message has always been the same that our priority is that he stays, even yesterday morning after the training session we had a conversation with Lamine directly which was very okay and friendly, where he also showed the desire to stay, that he was happy at the club, adapted to this.

‘During the day, we had a clear agreement for Balogun to go to Everton. Balogun flew yesterday [Tuesday] morning to go for a medical and sign a contract. Our plan worked very, very well in terms of generation of revenue, squad plan, player’s transfer.

‘Balo going, besides of the salary, was also an important income to the club which would have helped us balance the season and then Lamine is staying.

‘This is what we had until mid-afternoon, what happened is Chelsea was always testing and trying, ‘what about Lamine, what about Lamine?’, I’ve been talking to them in the last 10 days.

‘Around 4pm yesterday, we got a contact from Chelsea, ‘we sold a player in this position, deal done, is there any possibility that Monaco is open to selling Lamine?’. The answer was the same, ‘no, it’s not’. At this moment, Balo was in Liverpool undergoing his medicals, everything was going pretty well.

‘Around 7pm, we were contacted by Everton raising questions about the medical of Balo, which for our medical staff, which for the personal medical staff of the player, there was totally no sense. The explanations were not enough to justify or to bring concerns about the future of the player, which there isn’t.

‘This discussion started between medical departments from here and there [Everton]. It took Everton around two, three hours to go deep in their assessment, check with other doctors, this is a normal situation when the doctor of the club raises concerns, it’s quite normal clubs will look for other specialists, sharing images and discussing the case, this was ongoing.

‘Meanwhile, as everything on the last day this was in the press quite quickly, I would say around half hour after we were contacted it was already in the media that Balogun had failed his medical.

‘Chelsea saw the opportunity, ‘okay, Monaco need money, Balogun is struggling there, let’s try’. This is the game, it’s fair to play this game, there’s no problem.

‘Chelsea came, called us, ‘maybe we can be here for the solution’, and in this moment we had to open the door for the discussion. This was almost 8pm, we started to open negotiations with Chelsea for Lamine, I informed the player directly myself, I called him, I informed his agent as we always do, very open. We had discussions between the conditions for Chelsea to go to Chelsea, at the same time the medical discussion was ongoing with Balo.

‘And what happened around 10pm Everton realised there was no problem, as soon as we got the information we came back to Chelsea and said, ‘we have our deal there [with Balogun], there is no deal on Lamine’, because it is also fair to do this, it is also part of the game.

‘There is no reason that these kind of discussions are dynamic on the last day of the transfer window which all of us decided on the last day to try to find solutions, with the clock ticking, that now this kind of interaction becomes the bad guy in the room, that Monaco are not fair, Monaco are not right, everybody is very fair and nice, just Monaco are not… too much.

‘So this is the story we’re telling. We informed everyone there was no deal with Chelsea. The Premier League has a mechanism which you can request one extra hour to finish the paperwork, this was done five minutes before their transfer window closed for us to finish the paperwork with Everton for Balogun. I signed the contract, Everton signed the contract, at the last moment the player decided not to sign. And basically, the allegation of Balogun is that, ‘I’m not feeling well by the way the club treated me, I’m not feeling well by the way the medical department of Everton brought doubts about my future or my health, I’m not comfortable to sign a long contract here’. And that’s the way we finished our transfer window.

‘We are very, very happy that Lamine stayed. He’s one of the most important players for us.

‘My intention here is, as always, work for AS Monaco, I don’t want to create war with Chelsea, I don’t want to create war with Everton. What I mentioned before is the facts, whatever different interpretations or judgements that people can have doesn’t belong to me here, it’s not my role to judge whatever someone did at another club.

‘On Lamine, I really respect and understand because the player might have got excited during the day yesterday by conversations with the coach, by everything that a club like Chelsea can propose and promise a player, at the end of the day he also asked us to try to find a solution for him to go, but we explained the reasons why we did it and now we’re going to keep respect and work with him, knowing his mentality and character, we can expect him at full power the next game and he’s going to keep building his career.

‘As many other players, better things will come in the future, this is not the end of the world, it’s just one possibility. With a player of his level and talent, I’m confident he will have better options and offers than the one he had yesterday.’

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