After a long summer of twists and turns and nobody being very happy, it finally appears that Romelu Lukaku will be leaving Chelsea. His destination? Roma.
That’s according to Gazzetta dello Sport and Corriere dello Sport, who both cover the striker’s future today and Roma’s push to get him for Jose Mourinho.
We start with Gazzetta, who say the good relationship between Roma owner Dan Friedkin and Chelsea’s Todd Boehly has made a deal possible and Roma are pushing to get it done as soon as possible.
Friedkin flew to England to watch Chelsea beat Luton last night before sitting down for dinner with the Blues hierarchy to discuss Lukaku returning to Italy.
Roma have been working on the deal for ten days, convinced it would take right up until the end of the window to find an agreement, but everything changed on that front yesterday.
That is because Chelsea opened up to the idea of a loan, with the relationship between the two ownerships smoothing that part of the negotiation and speeding things along.
The Blues initially wanted the same conditions they agreed with Inter last year, €8m plus bonuses for a year long loan but Roma have resisted and have asked for a deal worth €11m in total but of which they would only pay €7m. This includes Lukaku’s wages, which he’s reduced, and the use of the Italian Growth Decree to aid them.
The clubs spoke about this until late yesterday evening and again this morning, trying to close the deal and leaving Lukaku with the final say.
The key part of the negotiations will be how much of Lukaku’s salary Roma pay, with the Italians asking for help from Chelsea on that front.
Corriere dello Sport, meanwhile, also state that Roma’s top executives have been in London since yesterday negotiating a loan deal. According to them, it would see Roma pay Lukaku’s €11m a year salary in full and nothing else.
The two clubs are also negotiating a potential purchase clause being included in the deal and there will be another meeting this morning after the two clubs talked long into the night.
The key part for Roma is that Chelsea have opened up to a loan deal and Lukaku is open to the move, having spoken to Jose Mourinho on the phone and been convinced.
The striker is currently in Brussels and the hope for Roma, and their fans, is to see him fly to Italy today. That could be via London, where he’d link up with Friedkin and Tiago Pinto, or via Milan.
Either way, Roma are very much dreaming of getting their man and believe that dream can become a reality, so long as there isn’t another twist in the long, drawn out Lukaku saga.
