Everton worsen relations with Romelu Lukaku by leaving him to pay £6,500 private-jet fare back from Belgium duty
ROMELU LUKAKU’S already tense relationship with Everton after a summer of transfer talk worsened as they refused to pay a £6,500 private jet fare back to the north-west after Belgium duty.
After securing a win in Cyprus last Tuesday for former boss Roberto Martinez‘s Belgium side, Lukaku, teammate Kevin Mirallas and other Belgians employed by north-west of England teams all hired a jet.
Liverpool, Manchester United, Manchester City and Burnley who all have Belgians on their books all agreed to stump up the £6,500 cost per head for the flight as they had league games on Saturday.
But despite now being owned by billionaire Farhad Moshiri, the Toffees do not play until tonight at Sunderland, so told Lukaku and Mirallas they would not chip in, leaving the duo to fork out £6,500 each themselves.
New boss at Goodison Ronald Koeman even gave his squad Wednesday off before making the trip to the north-east last Thursday,- but club bosses did not feel it was necessary to fork out £13,000 to bring their Belgian cohort back early.
But that has reportedly angered star player Lukaku, who scored his first two goals of the season in his nation’s 3-0 win in Nicosia, who is annoyed by the club’s stance given the relatively low cost.
A source told the : “The Belgium players at clubs in the north-west organised a private jet to fly them home from Cyprus, to get back quicker.
“All the other clubs agreed to pay the £6,500 cost for their players, and Lukaku wasn’t happy when Everton told him they wouldn’t pay.
“Mirallas was in the same position, and the two of them ended up paying for the flights themselves.”
Lukaku pledged his immediate future this season to the Toffees last month, but relations with the club are already strained as they dug their heels in over the forward’s proposed move back to former club Chelsea or Italian giants Juventus in the summer transfer window.
The feeling is the club, for the small monetary price, could have just paid it to try and keep their start turn sweet ahead of another long Premier League campaign.