wicked.football

Chelsea boss Thomas Tuchel refused to directly comment on the club’s reported pursuit of Romelu Lukaku, though hinted the Belgian would be a perfect fit when outlining what his current strikers lack.

After the likelihood of signing Dortmund’s Erling Haaland continued to diminish, a potential deal for Lukaku has come under the microscope. A recent report indicated Inter would be willing to accept a deal of around £110m – should Chelsea lodge a bid of that size.

Sky Sports then stated Lukaku had asked Inter to ‘accept a suitable Chelsea offer for him.’

With the Blues’ need for a clinical centre-forward great, the signs are all beginning to point toard a Lukaku return to Stamford Bridge.

And after his side drew 2-2 with Tottenham in a pre-season friendly on Wednesday, Blues boss Tuchel was quizzed on the matter .

“I will not talk about players who don’t play in my squad,” the German said.

“He is a fantastic player but a player from Inter and with all due respect I will not talk about him. Not everybody but I can imagine a lot of players want to come and join [Chelsea] but we don’t comment on that.”

However, with Oliver Giroud leaving for AC Milan, Chelsea are lacking a target man style striker in their squad. And when outlining the precise traits Chelsea now require from a striker, Tuchel described Lukaku to a tee.

He added: “I think with the exit from Olivier Giroud from the type of players we could use a player used to playing with their back to goal. Whose strength is to keep possession from long balls, so we can add this direct style of play to our portfolio.

“This is the characteristic of player that is not Tammy (Abraham), Timo (Werner) or Kai (Havertz). So this is a profile we don’t have in the squad and could be useful but not for any cost and not hectic or in panic.

“No matter what happens we will be competitive and have trust in our guys that we can still develop and that we have young players in the offensive part of the game who we demand that they need to improve.

“We are relaxed and very well aware of our situation at the same time.”

Where next for Man Utd’s exit-linked 10? Pogba, Martial, Lingard transfer chances rated

Lukaku deal would spark triple transfer

Meanwhile, Italian club Atalanta could be set to move for Tammy Abraham if Chelsea manage to seal a deal for Lukaku, according to a trusted source.

Italian journalist Fabrizio Romano recently tweeted ‘Chelsea are preparing a new official bid’ for Lukaku. And the transfer guru has added further information on Wednesday night.

He believes that if Inter do lose Lukaku to Chelsea, they will swoop for Atalanta ace Duvan Zapata. The 30-year-old, himself linked to Chelsea in April, has scored goals for fun with La Dea.

The Colombia international has bagged 66 from 130 outings and is on the radar of a number of clubs. Romano completed his transfer tweet by stating that Atalanta will try to sign Abraham if they lose Zapata.

READ MORE: Chelsea defender pursuit stalls as major hurdle emerges in deal

The post Tuchel hints at Chelsea, Lukaku move after highlighting issue with current crop appeared first on TEAMtalk.