Romelu Lukaku breaks silence to criticise agent over claims there is a 'problem' over Chelsea future

Romelu Lukaku has taken aim at his own agent for revealing he would seek talks with Chelsea’s new owners about the striker’s future and admitting “there was a problem” over the club’s record signing.

Todd Boehly, who is in the UK this weekend and is expected to be at Wembley on Saturday for Chelsea’s FA Cup final against Liverpool, having now met with head coach Thomas Tuchel, is waiting for the green light from the UK Government and the Premier League for his takeover to go through.

Lukaku’s future will be one of the top items on Boehly’s agenda and the Belgian’s agent, Federico Pastorello, gave an interview in which he confirmed his plans to try to speak with the American at the end of the season about his client, who cost Chelsea £97.5million last summer.

But Lukaku, who has not spoken since the controversial interview that caused him and Chelsea huge difficulties, hit back on Friday afternoon in a message he posted on Instagram that said: “Never ever will I let someone speak for me…I kept my mouth shut and focused on helping the team and end the season in the best way as possible.

“So if someone out there trying to say something about me and the club…Not in my name. RL.”

Lukaku has been consistently linked with a return to Inter Milan by Italian media, with AC Milan also credited with an interest, but Pastorello gave an interview in which he intended to try to dampen some of the speculation.

“I’m not the one to discuss technical choices, but it is obvious that there was a problem,” said Pastorello. “The numbers, however, must be weighted: he is the best scorer of the team this season, even with a lower playing time compared to his team-mates. The situation must be carefully evaluated, now there’s a Champions League spot to secure and the FA Cup final - Romelu is totally focused on that, we have not talked about anything else.

“He has Inter and their fans in his heart, he has never hidden that, as well as his love for Anderlecht where he would like to end his career. It’s nonsense to speculate on negotiations.

“Chelsea have just defined the takeover of the club, we still don’t know our new interlocutors, let alone if we can hypothesise talks with Inter, AC Milan or whatever. We have to be patient and wait.”

Responding to Pastorello’s comments and whether or not they presented an unwanted distraction ahead of the Cup final, Tuchel said: “I think if he plans to talk with the owner it is not his plan to talk with me! It’s fair enough. Let’s see if he gets a meeting. It is his right. We will talk to anybody. We will evaluate any situation of any player including Romelu. We will see what is going to happen and what the plans are.

“The attention is so high that sometimes it attracts situations that you don’t want to have before big matches. It’s the way it is. For me, it is not a distraction and hopefully for everybody that works on the team and the team itself it is not.”

Lukaku has scored three goals in his last two games and is hoping to keep his place in Chelsea’s starting line-up against Liverpool, with Tuchel claiming he is unlikely to start with both the 29-year-old and Kai Havertz.