Souness rips into Lukaku with rant as pundit fears for Tuchel, Chelsea season
Graeme Souness has said that there is nothing worse for a player to do to his club mid-season than what Romelu Lukaku has done at Chelsea.
The 28-year-old made headlines when he moved back to Stamford Bridge in the summer. Following a struggle for chances in his first spell, he had to prove himself at Everton, West Brom, Manchester United and Inter.
And after starring at Inter, Lukaku expressed his delight at being able to prove himself back at Chelsea as the Blues looked to plug arguably the only gap in their squad with a striker in his prime.
But despite a fast start with three goals in three Premier League games, he then suffered injury. Since his return, he has only netted two goals in six games and mostly played as a substitute.
And Lukaku’s situation took a major turn for the worse when he admitted that he has become unhappy at his situation. He also revealed his wish to move back to Inter – and not towards the end of his career.
Speaking in response to the comments, Souness slammed the Belgium international.
“I can’t tell you a worse thing that a player can do at this moment in the season,” the pundit told Sky Sports (via the Daily Mail).
“To come out and say basically I don’t want to be here, I don’t want to play with players I’m playing with anymore and the manager. And how that damages Chelsea going forward, it has to.”
Souness added: “He’s 29 years old he’s not 19 he should know better. It’s totally disrespectful. It damaged the football club enormously. It damages the manager.”
Blues boss Thomas Tuchel responded to Lukaku by saying that the comments are “not helpful”.
What’s more, he took action by dropping the striker from the squad for Sunday’s huge clash with Liverpool.
Nevertheless, Tuchel admitted that he does not want to turn the situation into more of a headline-grabbing situation than it already is.
Tuchel speaks out on Lukaku comments
The manager said: “We don’t like it, of course, because it brings noise that we don’t need and is not helpful.
“But on the other side, we don’t want to make more out of it than it actually is.
“You know very well how it is, it’s very easy to take lines out of context, to shorten lines to make headlines, then realise later it’s not so bad or what he meant.
Celebrating players who didn’t celebrate – Salah, Lingard, Ronaldo and more
“But let’s be honest, we don’t like it, because it’s noise we don’t need, we need a calm environment.
“I don’t feel him unhappy; I feel the exact opposite. If you ask me yesterday morning, I would say he is absolutely fine.”
Chelsea go into Sunday’s clash with Liverpool a point behind the Reds, who are eight off Premier League leaders Manchester City.
The post Souness rips into Lukaku with rant as pundit fears for Tuchel, Chelsea season appeared first on TEAMtalk.