Monaco vice president Vadim Vasilyev has clouded further confusion surrounding Thomas Lemar’s future after claiming the winger wanted to join Arsenal and Liverpool this summer.
Arsenal had a £92m offer for Lemar accepted on deadline day but the deal collapsed after Arsene Wenger conceded the France international decided to stay with the Ligue 1 giants.
Liverpool were also interested in the 21-year-old but were not willing to match Arsenal’s British transfer record fee, but Vasilyev has revealed Lemar was hopeful of joining one of the Premier League duo.
“It was not easy [to keep Lemar],” he told Russian outlet TASS, via Get French Football. “Thomas wanted to go to Arsenal and to Liverpool, but we had discussions and we took a communal decision so that he could stay here.
“He is a very important player for us. We could not have sold him, it would have affected the entire team and the individuals.”
Monaco were gutted of more than £150m worth of talent are set to receive more than double that when PSG trigger the option to buy in their loan agreement for Kylian Mbappe next summer.
Lemar is one of few star names that Monaco have managed to keep hold of this summer and he will be integral to any chance they have of retaining their Ligue 1 crown this summer.
In fact, no Ligue 1 player has registered more assists from set-pieces than Lemar (7) since the start of last season.
