The agent of Romelu Lukaku claims the arrival of the Saudi Pro League as a force in the transfer market made it difficult to secure a summer move for the Belgium striker.
Lukaku rejoined Chelsea in 2021 for a then club-record £97.5m but fell out with manager Thomas Tuchel and spent last season on loan with former side Inter.
The 30-year-old was expected to return to the Nerazzurri in another permanent exit from Stamford Bridge but negotiations collapsed when it emerged talks had been held with other clubs, including rivals Juventus.
Juve offered a swap deal that involved Dusan Vlahovic but nothing further materialised. Interest from Saudi Arabia never interested Lukaku, who wanted to remain in Europe, and he eventually reunited with former boss Jose Mourinho by joining Roma on loan.
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Sebastien Ledure, Lukaku‘s representative, has now revealed how the Saudi Pro League‘s summer of mass spending made it trickier to secure a move away from England for his client.
He told RTL: “It was very difficult, even impossible at the start of the transfer window, to talk about a loan solution.
“And what the owners of Chelsea were looking for was above all to find a definitive solution, a transaction, a permanent transfer. And the real change that happened this summer was the arrival of Saudi clubs on the international transfer market.
“They have set the bar so high in terms of the transfer compensation offered to European clubs and in this case to Chelsea, that it has become very difficult for European clubs to line up and therefore on the one hand, you have a club that is not opposed to a transfer.
“On the other hand, they are going to seek the maximum transfer fee which obviously, in this case, it was only the Saudi clubs that could achieve such large amounts.”
Lukaku made his Roma debut before the international break in a 2-1 loss to AC Milan and started in Belgium’s Euro 2024 qualifying win in Azerbaijan on Saturday.
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