Player biography Romelu Lukaku
The Belgian has defied the critics since his move to Internazionale
For someone who had to endure abject poverty during his childhood – so much so that his family often went without electricity for weeks and his mother, Adolphine, was forced to dilute the milk in the fridge to make it go further – Belgium and Internazionale striker Romelu Lukaku has gone on to enjoy remarkable career success.
Over the best part of a decade the 26-year-old has showcased the prodigious, the enduring and the explosive.
Barely 16 years of age when he made his debut for Anderlecht in the spring of 2009; a senior international just 10 months later; 84 caps for his country; a bronze medal at the 2018 World Cup; his country’s most prolific marksman of all-time with 52 goals, reaching that historical milestone at the tender age of 25.
A player of exceptional power, pace and penalty-box instincts, the Antwerpborn son of Congolese parents has also proved an outstanding finisher at club level, registering over 200 goals in almost 450 games for Anderlecht, Chelsea, West Bromwich Albion, Everton, Manchester United and Inter.
Yet, somehow, such achievements
have not translated into widespread fan or media appreciation. Mention the name Lukaku and the detractors immediately come running with a string of negatives: poor first touch, bull-in-a-china-shop disposition, wayward positional sense and flat-track bully tendencies, often accused of not delivering against stronger sides.
It does not seem to make sense: a player with so many alleged flaws and yet still a major transfer-market prize, costing over £187million in total. Signed by Everton from Chelsea in 2014 for £28m, moving to Manchester United three years later in a £75m deal, and making a £74m switch to Inter last summer, he is no bargain-basement buy.
Lukaku himself is only too aware that he is not to everyone’s taste. Check his thoughts on the matter in Belgian publication Sportmagazine in late 2016, when he said: “I am unloved but I remain on the pitch and there I’m just fine. A lot of people try to create a buzz with their blah-blah chat. I don’t look to prolong the debate. I reply on the field. I draw my inspiration from [US basketball stars] LeBron James and [the late] Kobe Bryant. Great champions who were criticised but managed to make themselves respected.”
Even in his Belgian homeland he has found popularity elusive, notably with regard to the national team.
After his international debut in 2010 he needed eight further appearances to get his name on the scoresheet and he received heavy criticism for missing a sitter against Bosnia in October 2016.
Only in the last three years or so have
the boo boys gone to ground, their vitriol extinguished by his serial goalscoring for the Diables Rouges.
Lukaku blames such recognition difficulties on his lengthy absence from the Belgian domestic scene, having quit Anderlecht for Chelsea at the age of 18.
“I was very young when I started my career and, in their minds, people retained the image of the player I was at Anderlecht,” he told Sportmagazine.
“They weren’t aware of the progress I had made. A journalist from the north of Belgium once argued that I didn’t deserve to play for Belgium because I wasn’t on form for my club. In fact,
I’d just scored five goals in four games.”
Nor did Lukaku garner huge amounts of respect during his two seasons with Manchester United. His style of play never seemed a snug fit there and in his second season he had a particularly hard time, leaking confidence, admitting to being overweight and falling down the pecking order when Ole Gunnar Solskjaer took over as manager from Jose Mourinho late in 2018.
Showered with brickbats from both the media and sections of the Old Trafford faithful, he became a scapegoat for the club’s trophyless woes, a symbol of a once-omnipotent club struggling to keep pace with the likes of Liverpool and Manchester City.
In truth, he was anything but a flop at United. His strike-rate of 42 goals in 96 games meant he considerably outscored fellow front-runners Marcus Rashford and Anthony Martial over the same period. And Lukaku also played a huge role in United’s most thrilling achievement last season, scoring twice in a 3-1 victory over Paris Saint-Germain – a result that put United in the quarter-finals of the Champions League on away goals.
Since moving to Italy six months ago, all has gone swimmingly for the Belgian and by early February he already had 20 goalscoring notches on his belt. Quite clearly, coach Antonio Conte is pushing all the right buttons.
Conte – who previously tried and
“I am unloved but I remain on the pitch and there I’m just fine”
failed to sign Lukaku while in charge at Juventus and Chelsea – is, crucially, playing to the striker’s strengths. Mindful that the Belgian is not a genuine target man, uncomfortable when holding the ball up and not a real threat in the air, he only wants to see him on the front foot, running with menace into open spaces.
Forming an excellent front-line partnership with Lautaro Martinez, Lukaku is here, there and everywhere, hunting for chances in the box but also equally obtrusive when dropping deep or drifting out wide to the right. Operational freedom is the key.
Whereas previous coaches such as Mourinho, Solskjaer and former Belgium boss Marc Wilmots insisted on him playing with his back to goal as a point-of-attack pivot, Conte and current Belgium head coach Roberto Martinez do not subscribe to a square-peg-inround-hole policy.
Lukaku has never has been a onedimensional battering ram. Isolate him up top or force him into dependency on long balls and crosses and he is not nearly so effective. Conte and Martinez are reaping the benefits of taking the centreforward shackles off, encouraging him to do what
he does best: hurtling towards goal and linking with other attackers. You should not play off Lukaku; you play with him.
Release the Lukaku handbrake and the effects can be devastating.
Take, for example, the goal that he created for Kevin De Bruyne in Belgium’s 2-1 victory over Brazil in the 2018 World Cup quarter-finals, gaining possession inside his own half, surging forward with pace and power, and then playing in De Bruyne to fire home.
Then there was his brilliant strike in Inter’s 2-1 Serie A win at Brescia in October, when a barrelling run along the right flank was followed by a smooth inside move and a delightful left-footed curler into the far corner of the net.
He was not enjoying his football at Manchester United and it showed in his demeanour. With Inter, however, it’s a completely different story. The side are firing on all cylinders under Conte, trophies are on the cards, and he and his coach very much appreciate one another.
Lukaku always knew the coach was on his side. “My relationship with Conte started when Belgium met his Italy in a friendly [in 2015],” he explained on Italian TV show “I noticed he played
“Martinez released me from international prison. [Before he became Belgium coach] I’d play good matches and bad. Now I only put in good performances”
with two forwards, Eder and Pelle, and that after only 15 minutes Pelle had three good goalscoring chances.
“I realised that in such a playing style, in such a system, I would have a lot of opportunities to score myself and that it would enhance my physical abilities.
“I loved his type of game. The two front men have a fundamental role. They have fun and a lot of chances are created.
“After the game we talked a little and he told me he was going to take over at Chelsea. But it wasn’t possible for me to go there [as I was under contract at Everton]. I told him that if he went somewhere else in the future, I would follow him.”
Lukaku cites five coaches as the most influential in his career: Conte, Martinez, Steve Clarke at West Brom, Ronald Koeman at Everton and ex-Anderlecht boss Ariel Jacobs, the man who gave him his debut.
Following a difficult first season at Chelsea – which was mainly spent on the first-team bench or playing for the under-23 side – what the young Lukaku required above all was Premier League first-team football and Clarke would provide it, persuading him to join West Brom on a single-season loan.
The result was a string of impressive performances and 17 top-flight goals. No wonder Lukaku describes Clarke as the figure who released his talent.
Fastidious, opinionated and an avowed enemy of untapped potential, Koeman certainly got the best out of Lukaku at Everton in the 2016-17 campaign, in which the Belgian front man bagged no fewer than 25 Premier League goals.
Apparently the Dutch coach and the young Belgian whippersnapper did not always see eye to eye, but the chemistry worked. “With Romelu we had enough fights about how he needs to press, how he needs to run, how he needs to move,” Koeman told the Liverpool Echo. “But in the box, with opportunities to score, he is one of the best.”
A run of poor results saw Koeman sacked early the following season and, not without justification he blamed his fate on the vast hole left by the sale a few months previously of Lukaku.
As for Jacobs, the coach who took him out of the school classroom in the spring of 2009 and found a place for him in his first team, one
can only compliment him on his sound judgement and boldness. Some Belgian cynics claimed at the time that Lukaku’s sweet 16 call-up was nothing more than a publicity stunt, a move designed to prove that Anderlecht’s academy was bearing as much fruit as that of archrivals Standard Liege. How wrong that assessment was.
The kid was the real deal and within a year he would be a fully fledged national headliner, the top scorer in the 2009-10 Belgian league, a domestic champion and a full international.
“Hats off to Romelu for the calm way he dealt with the hype,” says Jacobs. “He’s healthy, cool and adult in his attitude. It’s not always easy for such young shoulders to carry this sort of baggage.”
Belgiun coach Martinez and Lukaku have been a viable double act for years, with Martinez behind the striker’s initial loan move to Everton in the summer of 2013. He subsequently signed him permanently, being more than happy to shell out a then club record fee.
In their three years together at Goodison Park, Lukaku amassed 61 goals in all competitions, and since the pair teamed up internationally, in August 2016, the striker has kept up the good work, netting an incredible 35 times in 33 appearances for Belgium.
Theirs is a mutual appreciation society. While Martinez unhesitatingly describes Lukaku as the best striker in the world, the striker is equally happy to return serve, wholly attributing his recent national team successes to the Spaniard.
“Martinez released me from international prison,” Lukaku told
Sportmagazine. “[Before he arrived],
I’d play good matches and bad. Now
I only put in good performances.
“I’m not just speaking for myself. There’s Eden [Hazard], Kevin [De Bruyne], Meunier, Carrasco. Since he [Martinez] turned up there, we have many more players who are up for it.”
Not surprisingly Lukaku does not include Mourinho and Solskjaer on the “debt of gratitude” list.
Solskjaer simply did not rate him, while Mourinho took a long time to be convinced. Shortly after beginning his second spell in charge of Chelsea, in the summer of 2013, Mourinho was adamant that Lukaku – fresh from a successful temporary posting at West Brom – was still too raw to make a Stamford Bridge first-team impact, recommending another loan spell, this time with Everton. Lukaku felt slighted.
He only played a handful of games under Mourinho at Chelsea but the pair did work well together for a good season
“I told [mum] one day: ‘I’m going to play football for Anderlecht. It’s going to happen soon’... I was six”
and a half at Manchester United, and for a period they functioned hand in glove, Lukaku plundering 11 goals in his first 10 appearances for United and Mourinho regularly praising the Belgian for his work ethic.
They say that the apple never falls far from the tree and the phrase definitely is appropriate in Lukaku’s case. His father Roger was an excellent striker himself, starring in the
1990s for Belgian sides Seraing,
Germinal Ekeren, Mechelen and Ostende, as well as the Zaire – now Democratic Republic of Congo – national team.
Slim and lithe, Lukaku senior did not have anything like his son’s muscular mass but he was a fine finisher all the same, particularly dangerous with his potent left-footed shooting.
If Romelu and his younger brother Jordan – who these days plays left-back for Serie A rivals Lazio – are now both senior Belgium internationals, dad Roger must take a lot of the credit. He passed on the love of the game to his kids, encouraged them to sign for his old club FC Boom as toddlers and had plenty of good advice to offer. Romelu and Jordan’s parents divorced when the children were in their early teens, but Roger remained their footballing guide and mentor, especially uncompromising when dishing out discipline.
“You will never catch me in a nightclub sipping champagne,” Romelu once explained. “In our house, the word ‘disco’ had a diabolical meaning. After Anderlecht clinched the Belgian league title in 2010 I remember asking my father if I could go to a nightclub.
“My dad wouldn’t allow it because
I had school the next day. “
At the end of Roger’s footballing career he suffered no end of economic difficulties. Steady work was hard to find and the family lapsed into penury. No car, no cash for bills, hardly enough money for food and definitely no luxuries. Times were tough and it was at this point that Lukaku made a life-defining promise to his loved ones as well as himself.
“Some days I’d come home from school to find my mum crying,” he said in a no-holds barred interview on the
Players’ Tribune website in 2018. “So I finally told her one day: ‘Mum, it’s going to change. You’ll see. I’m going to play football for Anderlecht. It’s going to happen soon. We’ll be good. You won’t have to worry anymore’. I was six.”
Suddenly football was not only a game to him; it was a means to an end, a route out of poverty and despair. He now had a mission and put his heart and soul into making a name for himself, impressing in the schoolboy ranks of FC Boom and KFC Wintam, scoring goals galore at the Lierse academy, then decamping at the age of 13 to Anderlecht, where he would continue to whip up a storm.
Not for one moment did he ever doubt his capacity to climb to the top.
“In Romelu, I discovered a 16-year-old of great mental toughness,” said his old Anderlecht coach Jacobs. “That’s what has brought him so far.”