Ajax were left furious after Manchester United completed an £85million deadline day swoop for their Brazilian winger Antony.

United launched a full-scale raid on the Dutch champions this summer as they snapped up their manager Erik ten Hag before landing defender Lisandro Martinez and winger Antony.

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Manchester United’s interest in the latter led to him refusing to play for Ajax until they accepted an offer from the Red Devils – which was eventually concluded on Thursday.

Ajax sporting director Gerry Hamstra was left fuming at the way the deal for the Brazilian played out which left coach Alfred Schreuder short of options.

“Manchester United’s timing was so bad,” Hamstra told Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf.”

“The last few days [of the transfer window] became even more hectic after Ajax had already gone through a major rebuild of the squad following the departure of lots of top-class players.

“It was so difficult to leave our manager with such a void. We all think we lost too many first-team players who always start. We had a summer with totally different expectations.

“We wanted to keep the group together as much as possible to be able to perform well in the Champions League and to carry on being successful.

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“That’s what we talked about with Alfred. Of course we knew there were a few snags.

“But no one had foreseen that our players would be bought for such huge sums of money.”

It could have been even worse for Ajax had they not turned down United’s bid for defender Jurrien Timber earlier in the transfer window.

But they did manage to land Lucas Ocampos on-loan from Sevilla moments before the transfer deadline to attempt to fill the void left by Antony.

The Red Devils paid £55m for Ajax defender Lisandro Martinez in July but it wasn’t all plain sailing for the Argentina international who reportedly called Hamstra a ‘f****** nobody’ in a bid to push through his move to Old Trafford.

Reluctant to lose their star names, Ajax tried to hold firm but Antony’s decision to go on strike ultimately led to his late exit leaving Schreuder furious.

Hamstra added: “I understand Schreuder’s anger, very much so. I have been a manager myself, so I know how annoying it is when your best player leaves at the very last minute.

“’We did not want this, we wanted to keep Antony.”

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Meanwhile, Antony made the perfect start to his United career, scoring in his first start for the club.

The winger fired in United’s opener in Sunday’s 3-1 win over Arsenal to inflict a first defeat of the season on the Gunners.