Regardless of how the current season ends, Romelu Lukaku will not remain at Inter Milan next year. Instead, the forward plans to return to Chelsea.
Since coming
to San Siro last summer, the 29-year-old has scored just three times in 14
Serie A games. His play has been hampered by a series of injuries in the first
half of the season.
He has
played a bigger part in the team recently, scoring the game-winning goal that
advanced Inter to the quarterfinals of the Champions League against Porto last
month off the bench in the home leg.
Lukaku was able to play the entire 90 minutes on Friday for the first time since the first game of the season, netting in a 2-1 defeat to Spezia.
Inter's CEO
Giuseppe Marotta recently disclosed that Lukaku was "carrying 103kg on his
shoulders" and is still not fully match-ready, raising persistent concerns
about his lack of fitness.
Lukaku is
reportedly wanted by Chelsea, either permanently or on another loan, but
Marotta has now said that Inter will not be trying to keep the striker longer
than necessary.
The Inter
manager informed Sky Italia that because the loan was only for a single season,
regardless of how well he performs, on June 30 he would return to Chelsea.
"This
has been a season like no other," I'm obviously referring to the World
Cup. To play his best game, Lukaku lacks the necessary level of conditioning.
He's still
not performing well, or the player we got to see in years gone by.’
Lukaku led
Inter to the Scudetto in the 2020–21 season with 24 goals and 11 assists before
deciding to return to Stamford Bridge.
However,
upon his return to the Premier League last season, he only scored eight goals
in 26 appearances and had a falling out with the then-manager Thomas Tuchel before
being loaned back to Inter.
Graham
Potter's appointment isn’t expected to give Romelu Lukaku a second chance
because Chelsea has made acquiring a new striker one of their top transfer
priorities for the summer transfer window.
Chelsea had
hoped Inter would take Lukaku on loan for a second season, but that won't
happen now, so they'll probably need to take a significant hit on the £97
million deal.
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