Napoli market, Aurelio De Laurentiis is fed up: Romelu Lukaku is leaving
As soon as he landed in Naples, Antonio Conte asked Aurelio De Laurentiis for the purchase of his faithful Romelu Lukaku: there is a special bond between the two, which, however, has faded somewhat in recent times due to the mighty Belgian’s injuries. The center forward hurt his thigh in August and is still in the pits: he could fly with the team to Riyadh for Thursday’s Italian Super Cup against AC Milan but will surely sit on the bench. Antonio Conte and the Napoli medical staff do not want to risk further relapses that could further compromise Lukaku’s season.
Of course, the Belgian striker’s imposing physical size is an obstacle in these situations: the body needs more time to recover from injuries but Napoli seems to have lost faith in the center forward. According to the latest rumors, Aurelio De Laurentiis is fed up and would like to sell Romelu Lukaku in the summer: on his tracks are a number of clubs from Saudi Arabia that had already sounded the ground in the past. The partenopei owner is not at all happy to pay a 6 million euros net per season salary to player who is often in the box and would prefer to sell him to make room for a new younger player with a lower salary.
Last season Romelu Lukaku played a very important role in the path that led Napoli to win the Scudetto: in fact, the powerful striker collected 14 goals and 10 assists in 36 games, then in August thigh trouble changed everything. In Naples he was expected to be back available within a couple of months, but instead the Belgian is struggling to get over the injury and may only see himself back on the field in late December. Clearly then there will be a major pathway to fit in: the player has been out for a very long time and will obviously be late in condition, so it will take more time before we see him at 100 percent fitness.
In Saudi Arabia Romelu Lukaku could sign very important contracts: the sheikhs are always willing to sign big names in European soccer and shower them with money to convince them to choose the Saudi Pro League. In recent years, thanks precisely to very important investments, the level of the Arab league has risen a great deal.
The transfer of Cristiano Ronaldo to Al Nassr gave the ‘start’ to a major exodus of great champions to Arab lands: after the Portuguese came, for example, Karim Benzema, Ivan Toney, Riyad Mahrez, and many other champions who have helped the development of soccer in Saudi Arabia very much.
