Roma reached an agreement with United to sign Smalling, submitted his new contract, but forgot a mandatory document, which prevents the deal from being complete. The club has asked for an extension to present the missing document.
When something like this happens, it is impossible not to think about what happened to Real Madrid when they signed David De Gea. Well, two similar situations have occurred in this transfer market.
According to 'SportItalia', the transfer of Smalling, which is still up in the air, has hit some problems. The Italian club submitted his new contract after having agreed on a deal with Manchester United, but forgot a document which was needed to close the deal.
The club was informed about this but too late and when the transfer market had already closed. As an urgent measure, Friedkin, the new owner, has asked for an extension in order to be able to present this document that they now have in their possession.
If this is not allowed, Smalling will have to return to Manchester United, where he has no place in Solskjaer's squad.
Smalling's isn't the only case. Rashica was one step away from being a new player for Bayer Leverkusen and the agreement between the parties took so long to come about that the market had already closed. Rudi Völler explained: "There were difficulties with the buy clause. Bremen and we had different ideas about this, but in the end there was not enough time".