Chelsea and Juventus could seal a swap deal involving Romelu Lukaku and Dusan Vlahovic ‘as early as this week’, according to reports.
The Blues have brought in Axel Disasi, Robert Sanchez, Lesley Ugochukwu, Christopher Nkunku, Nicolas Jackson, Angelo and Diego Moreira this summer as new owners Todd Boehly and Behdad Eghbali continue to add to Pochettino’s squad.
13 players have left the club permanently this summer as Mauricio Pochettino looked to reduce the size of the squad with the Argentinian happy to work with a core squad of 23 players.
Lukaku is another player that Pochettino would happily get off the Chelsea wage bill following his disastrous return to Stamford Bridge.
The Belgium international returned to the club in 2021 in a £97.5m deal from Inter Milan but he was sent back to the Serie A giants on loan last season after an unsuccessful first year at the Premier League club.
There were rumours that Inter would sign him permanently this summer but they reportedly became annoyed when they found out he was negotiating with Italian rivals Juventus at the same time.
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And now a move to Juve seems the most likely option with the Italians ready to allow Vlahovic go in the other direction if Chelsea send money with Lukaku.
There were rumours the Old Lady wanted €50m and Lukaku for Vlahovic but a report last week insisted that they are now willing to take €40m.
A deal is edging closer with Italian newspaper Gazzetta dello Sport claiming that Juventus now see the deal as ‘advantageous from an economic point of view’.
Juve have now ‘accepted’ that the transfer could be beneficial and they have ‘started negotiating’ with Chelsea – but there is still a gap in negotiations.
But Gazzetta are confident that ‘the deal will be done’ with the transfer sealed ‘as early as this week’ despite Juventus still needing to be ‘financially satisfied’ by Chelsea.
It is understood that the Blues ‘have so far reached €20m’ but that Juve are looking for €40m plus Lukaku for the deal to go through.
In the same vein, Corriere dello Sport say that a transfer is ‘nearing its epilogue’ and that the distance between the two sides ‘is not huge’ with all parties working to get the deal over the line.
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