When Folarin Balogun was scoring World Cup goals with 30 million Americans watching, or as he sat onstage with LeBron James as the tournament wound down, he seemed like the prime candidate for a prime summer move to a superclub that could further his stardom.He was 25 years old and one of the faces of the 2026 World Cup. He signed with LeBron’s agency, Klutch Sports, to capitalize. He went on major morning shows, and a major transfer seemed to be next. At the very least, surely, Balogun had to find a route to continued relevance.Yet when clocks struck 11 p.m. in England on Tuesday and the transfer window closed, no such move materialized.Balogun had traveled to Merseyside to sign with Everton, but after the 11th hour, with issues arising during his medical, an agreed-upon deal collapsed.Even though Everton submitted a dealsheet document to the Premier League, a mechanism designed to give clubs an extra two-hour slot to finalize transfers that press up against the transfer window’s deadline, Balogun left the club’s Finch Farm training ground, opting not to put pen to paper.Balogun was not alone in seeing a move from the Principality to the Premier League collapse. Monaco pulled out of a deal to sell Senegalese midfielder Lamine Camara to Chelsea at the eleventh hour ahead of Tuesday’s transfer deadline.The Balogun non-deal left Everton and David Moyes with limited striker options as the transfer window closed. (Matt McNulty / Getty Images)And so, at the end of a dreamy summer, two months after he seized every spotlight imaginable, Balogun will retreat to the relative anonymity of Monaco, to home games at a half-empty 16,360-seat stadium, to a league that few in the United States know how to watch.It’s a hugely disappointing outcome for Balogun, who seemed ready to leap back to England. After lighting up the World Cup, he was vaguely linked with a move to multiple Premier League clubs, including Tottenham Hotspur. As the end of the summer window neared, Aston Villa popped up as a potential suitor, then Everton came calling. Although they weren’t ideal landing spots, each would have been a step up from Monaco.Spurs ultimately secured a loan deal for Omar Marmoush (with an obligation to buy next summer), and Villa went for Nicolas Jackson, two strikers who scored a combined zero goals in nine 2026 World Cup games.