BARCELONA
Monchi: Roma studying legal options after Barça sign Malcom
Monchi goes into detail about what happened with Malcom and said it is "easy to explain but hard to understand" after the player moves to Barcelona.
Monchi has explained to television in Rome that the Italian side are set to take action over Malcom's move to Barcelona. The player was set to join AS Roma before Barcelona upped the ante and outbid the Serie A side.
"Now, within the club, we are looking at our options, looking to see if it's legal. It's true that nothing was signed but there are a lot of messages with agents and their president that, at the very least, need to be looked at."
On Monday afternoon, it seemed as though the deal was done, "At five in the afternoon, we arrived at an agreement; with the agent, with the player and with Girondins. It was done and we had permission to bring the player to Roma for a medical. There was a flight scheduled at nine of clock and he would arrive at 11. We were calm."
That night, both clubs sent out an official announcement and Monchi says, "once we reached an agreement with Bordeaux, 30 minutes later, their president, Stephane Martin, called me and told me there were many rumours about the deal and that it would be better to make it official. Everything was done, but an hour after that, rumours started to circulate about new interest from Barcelona. We knew that there was interest from other clubs a few days before and Barcelona was one of them. Because of this, we reached an agreement as soon as possible. It was done. That's why I was surprised when the players agents called me and told me Bordeaux had rejected permission for the player to travel to Rome."
Monchi says the Malcom deal "was done"
It was explained to Monchi that there was a better offer from Barcelona. The French club's president said Roma would have to up their bid and Monchi says that's what he did after getting the green light from the president. A that point, Monchi informed the president of Girondins that Roma were willing to surpass Barça's offer and he was told he would have to send in the official offer. "At 11 of clock, we presented a formal document with president Pallotta was willing to offer. The agents and the president told me that if everything was agreed, on Tuesday, we could exchange documents and the player could travel to Rome that night. Early this morning, I spoke with the agent, Fernando Garcia, who had a meeting with Bordeaux in the morning to confirm that everything was ready."
However, the story had another twist. "After the meeting, it surprised me that the agents and Bordeaux wanted an even better offer and that Barcelona were pressing for an agreement. I said no because we didn't want to get involved in an auction and we couldn't continue like that. Yesterday, we had lifted out offer to the wishes of our president. And that's how it ended."
Monchi said previously, "The story of Malcom is easy to explain but hard to understand."
