Chelsea have opened up to a loan deal and the yellow and red club are asking for help on salary. Romelu will give the definitive answer today Mourinho’s phone call was also decisive
Today is really the day of the big dream. Even if Rome has already started dreaming for 24 hours and that is since Ryan Friedkin and Tiago Pinto took the private plane of the Giallorossi presidency to go to London. With the aim of returning with Romelu Lukaku, which could already happen in these hours. For Roma it would be the coup from a thousand and one nights, in the style of what happened in 2000 with Gabriel Omar Batistuta, the man of the third yellow and red flag. And the Scudetto since yesterday is the other great Romanist dream, fueled by the possibility of seeing a sparkling couple in attack: the delights of Dybala and the power of Lukaku.
the facts
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Roma had been working on the Lukaku hypothesis for about ten days, even if always under the radar and with the conviction that it would have been an operation to be carried out in case of the last days of the transfer market. Then, however, something changed yesterday and that is that Chelsea for the first time opened up to the loan of the Belgian striker. The reason? The stall in the market around Big Rom and the friendly relations between the two American properties: on one side Dan Friedkin (who reached London in the evening), on the other Todd Boehly. So much so that Chelsea immediately let Roma know that they would only talk to her about the loan. The streets of the market, as we know, however, are strange and so the Roma management preferred to leave immediately for London, to try to speed up, close and avoid any intrusion by others. Lukaku on loan, in fact, is still a delicious tidbit for someone else too. Even if yesterday the Belgian (from Brussels) had a video call with Mourinho, who showed him an ambitious project, which with him can take off towards very ambitious shores.
negotiation
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So Ryan Friedkin and Pinto landed at the private Farnborough airport, where they arrived at 18.25, about fifty minutes away from Stamford Bridge. From there, they raced towards Chelsea’s home, where they witnessed the Blues win over Luton (3-0) and then, over dinner, they started negotiating: an expensive loan with the right to buy. Chelsea asked for the same conditions as last year with Inter, 8 million plus bonuses. Roma, for its part, instead reiterated to the English club the need to participate in part of the engagement. Lukaku had in fact lowered his salary with Juventus, from 11 to 8.5 million, but because he would have signed a three-year contract while here it is a one-year loan deal. In short, Rome has asked Lukaku for all 11 million, which with the gross growth decree would mean around 16. Rome is working on it, of those 11 they would like to pay 7, with the rest to be paid by the Blues (who, however, would collect loan money). Chelsea and Roma talked about this until late yesterday evening. And they will do it again this morning, trying to close the deal. Even if Lukaku then reserved the right to give a definitive answer today…
last option
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Chelsea hadn’t actually planned to loan Lukaku. Indeed, for over a month he reiterated to Inter, Juve and the other interested parties that the Belgian would only be available on a permanent basis. The price at the beginning was at least 50 million: only the Saudis of Al Hilal had reached it, but Lukaku never wanted to go to Arabia. The rating then gradually dropped to 40, a figure that Inter has never even come close to and that Juve tried to overturn by getting that money (in addition to Lukaku) in the exchange with Vlahovic. Proposal that from Stamford Bridge they returned to the sender. Then as the end of the Roma market approached it became a problem for the Blues. He’s not part of the first team, he trains at Cobham first alone and in the last few weeks with the Under 21s and has never been considered for the first team, not even now that Chelsea bring forwards from the Primavera to the bench. Lukaku has never spoken to Pochettino, who in recent days has had to answer more questions about him (“It’s a situation that I found like this when I arrived, an agreement between the player and the club. It’s not a situation that belongs to me or over which I have power”, the response of the Argentine coach) than on the team. When, in addition to the Juve hypothesis, the Saudi League parachute also waned, with Al Hilal investing the money in Fulham’s Mitrovic after also taking Neyamr, it was clear to Chelsea that to solve the Lukaku problem it would be necessary to open up to the loan . To do this, they also had to review their strategies, keeping the last international loan slot free for Lukaku (the penultimate will go to Deivid Washington, the eighteen-year-old Brazilian taken for 20 million from Santos and destined for Strasbourg), temporarily selling Andrey Santos to Nottingham Forest instead of Lesley Ugochukwu, also destined for Strasbourg. Closing the telenovela Lukaku, at least for this 2023-24, was instead the most important thing.
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the condition
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Should he land in Rome, the first thing Lukaku will have to do is recover his condition. He hasn’t played a real match for two months, he skipped all preparation, working alone or with the Primavera, which has a different pace. The attacker will need to physically match his teammates and find the rhythm of the game. He will gradually be brought into condition without asking him for everything immediately, without deluding himself (starting with him) that a goal in the first few games means that Big Rom is back. Rome, however, meanwhile dreams. And expect to hug him already today.
August 26, 2023 (change August 26, 2023 | 08:22)
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2023-08-26 06:05:23
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