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Andrei Kanchelskis is comfortably Everton’s most successful Russian import.

But the turbo-charged winger who fired 22 goals in 60 appearances after becoming Everton’s record signing from Manchester United in the summer of 1995, has a curious explanation as to why Andrei Yarmolenko didn’t follow him to Goodison.

During the summer of 2016, and beyond, Roberto Martinez pursued the Dinamo Kiev forward relentlessly.

But Kiev’s asking price rose and rose, and as a result Yarmolenko is still plying his trade in the Ukraine.

In his new autobiography, ‘Russian Winters’ published today by deCoubertin books, Kanchelskis explains: “When doing business with clubs from the former Soviet Union you have to look beneath the surface.

“There is a story of how the chairman of Dynamo Kiev is bid £5m for a player and that night he goes to the casino and loses £2m. The next day the fee rises to £7m.

“Andrei Yarmolenko could and should have gone from Kiev to Everton in the summer of 2016 but the price kept changing.

“Everton were quoted £20m for the forward and then it became £25m and, eventually, the deal didn’t happen. I joked to myself that the directors of Dynamo Kiev must be losing an awful lot of money in the casinos.”