Thomas Tuchel tight-lipped on reports linking Romelu Lukaku with Chelsea return

 Chelsea boss Thomas Tuchel refused

 to comment on whether his club are 

interested in signing Inter Milan

 striker Romelu Lukaku.

Reports emerged in Italy on Wednesday

 night that the Belgium international told

 Inter to accept a bid from Chelsea, 

which would see him return to Stamford 

Bridge after a spell between 2011 and 

2014.

Tuchel was quizzed on the matter after 

his side drew 2-2 with Tottenham in a 

pre-season friendly on Wednesday, but 

did not give anything away.

“I will not talk about players who don’t 

play in my squad,” the German said.

“He is a fantastic player but a player from 

Inter and with all due respect I will not

 talk about him. Not everybody but I 

can imagine a lot of players want to 

come and join [Chelsea] but we don’t 

comment on that.”

With Oliver Giroud leaving for AC 

Milan, Chelsea are lacking a target man 

style striker in their squad.

Tuchel added: “I think with the exit from 

Olivier Giroud from the type of players 

we could use a player used to playing with

 their back to goal, whose strength is 

to keep possession from long balls, so 

we can add this direct style of play to 

our portfolio.

“This is the characteristic of player 

that is not Tammy (Abraham), Timo 

(Werner) or Kai (Havertz) so this is a 

profile we don’t have in the squad and 

could be useful but not for any cost and 

not hectic or in panic.

“No matter what happens we will 

be competitive and have trust in our guys

 that we can still develop and that we 

have young players in the offensive part 

of the game who we demand that they 

need to improve.

“We are relaxed and very well aware 

of our situation at the same time.”