Belgium striker Romelu Lukaku has completed a surprising return to Inter Milan on a loan deal after spending just one season at Chelsea.
Lukaku joined Chelsea for £98 million last season in his second spell at the club but it turned out to be a nightmare as he struggled throughout the season and had to publicly say that he regrets joining the Blues.
On Friday, June 29, 2022, the Belgian striker completed a return to Inter Milan on a one-year loan deal, costing £6.9million.
Many Inter Milan fans were happy to see the Belgian when he arrived on Tuesday to finalize the deal.
While confirming the loan deal, a statement from Chelsea read: ‘Romelu Lukaku will spend the 2022-23 campaign with Inter Milan after completing a season-long loan.
Before now, Inter Milan chief executive officer Giuseppe Marotta confirmed that Lukaku would join the Italian club on loan ahead of the coming season.
‘We have to thank the availability of the presidency and the owners. I hope it can be closed, not in a few hours, but a few days.’ He said. ‘We cannot make it official yet,’ he added. ‘He is a returning player who has done very well with us and we are happy to bring him home.’
The 29-year-old scored only 8 goals in all competitions for Chelsea during the 2021–22 season, failing to live up to the performances that led Chelsea to spend over £97 million to bring him to the club last summer.
After joining Inter for the first time in the summer of 2019, Lukaku helped Antonio Conte’s team win the Scudetto in 2020–21 by scoring 24 goals in Serie A.
However, he agreed to go back to Chelsea in August 2021, a Premier League club he had previously played for from 2011 to 2014.
Just like his first spell at Chelsea which was a complete disaster, Lukaku’s second spell at Chelsea was full of fitness issues and his controversial Sky Italia interview in December, in which he acknowledged he was “not happy” at Chelsea. His comments in the interview were one of the reasons he was dropped by manager Thomas Tuchel in the second half of the 2021-2022 season.
Although he did start the FA Cup final against Liverpool, Lukaku was unable to give the Blues the victory they needed to win a trophy this year as a second-half substitute.
With the World Cup only a few months away, the attacker will be conscious of the necessity of playing regular games to secure his starting position for Belgium in Qatar.
Even though Lukaku still has four years left on his Stamford Bridge contract, he wishes to return to the San Siro permanently, but the Italian heavyweights were able to grant him that wish by bringing him back on loan. Just like most clubs in Europe, Inter Milan are said to be struggling with a lack of money and are treading carefully when it comes to financial fair play.
Now that the Belgian international has returned to Inter Milan where he played the best of his football between 2019 and 2021, Chelsea’s fans would be watching with a keen interest to see the difference the move would make in his form.
