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On Sunday, the president of the French champions Jean-Michel Aulas announced that the club's star from Ghana Michael Essien will stay in Lyon.
For the English champions in London, who have been trying to acquire the best player of the last season's Ligue 1 all summer, Lyon presented an ultimatum to submit an offer by Sunday that would reach the requested amount of 45 million euros.
However, this amount seemed too high to Roman Abramovich, the billionaire owner of Chelsea, and the final offer was 38 million euros plus the Portuguese Tiago, who Lyon had shown interest in earlier.
"We rejected Chelsea's final offer and we are ending negotiations," said Aulas. "This is very good news for the club."
Meanwhile, it is believed that the 22-year-old right-back M. Essien is dissatisfied with Lyon's actions and has even stated that he will never play for Lyon's team again.
M. Essien has not yet played for Lyon this season, so it is doubtful whether Jean-Michel Aulas's statement really means the end of negotiations, as Lyon had previously issued an ultimatum to Chelsea but continued negotiations.
These suspicions were further strengthened by reports that after the famous J.M. Aulas statement, Chelsea's owner Roman Abramovich himself called him and asked for a meeting on Tuesday, so the end of this prolonged transfer drama is postponed for a few more days.
