Romelu Lukaku was a bad fit for Manchester United. He was an incredibly talented forward, but he was not a target man and that was the role that Jose Mourinho hoped he could operate in during his tenure.
As United fans will remember, the Belgian's close control left a lot to be desired and this led him to be ridiculed by rival fans and eventually the Old Trafford faithful. United fans were happy to see the back of Lukaku when he departed for Inter Milan in a deal that saw the club lose some money, but not a substantial amount.
Of course, when Lukaku reached Milan and finally played under Antonio Conte who had been chasing him since his Chelsea days, he became one of the most unstoppable forwards in world football. In 95 games he scored 64 goals and registered 16 assists.
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Many had wondered why the striker was always better for Belgium and Inter. The simple answer was because they played to his strengths; allowing him to run onto through balls and be the last point of every attack rather than be involved in the build-up.
Chelsea saw this form and with Thomas Tuchel needing more goals in the side, they spent just around £100m on Lukaku. The expectation that he would be the piece of the puzzle that would allow them to go toe to toe with Manchester City and Liverpool; reality however is often disappointing.
In 44 games, Lukaku scored 15 goals and registered two assists and only eight of his strikes came in the Premier League. Chelsea fans were also left irate when only a few months into the season the 29-year-old gave an interview with Sky Italy that seemed to suggest he was already thinking of returning to Italy.
Part of the problem however was that Tuchel fell into the same trap as Mourinho. Rather than using Kai Havertz in Lautaro Martinez's role to free up space for Lukaku to thrive and score, they instead wanted Lukaku to be the focal point of the attack and would fire in passes to him to hold up, but he would often fail to control them and the attack would lose momentum.
It was a trial by fire, but most strikers have the tools to deal with that; with Lukaku it was like fighting the inferno with a water pistol filled with petrol. His best and most effective games came when Chelsea played him mainly as a goal threat and fired the balls into him, Aston Villa comes to mind, but these opportunities are few and far between.
According to reports in Italy, Lukaku looks set to return to Inter for a loan fee of only £8.5m. Many Chelsea fans believed their club would do what Mourinho and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer could not and unlock the Belgian forward, but this has obviously not been the case.
Lukaku is most importantly another lesson in the dangers of wrongly profiling a talented player as it can leave you significantly out of pocket with a limited return. United did this with Lukaku and they also did it with Paul Pogba and Donny van de Beek, so hopefully, they will not do it again.
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