Chelsea were on Monday ready to allow Romelu Lukaku to join Everton or West Bromwich Albion on a season-long loan after rejecting advances from a series of clubs for Demba Ba.
With Samuel Eto'o joining Fernando Torres last week as the club's two senior strikers, manager Jose Mourinho was always happy to allow either Ba or Lukaku to go on loan. There was a firm offer from Arsenal for Ba, as well as interest from Valencia, Napoli and West Ham United.
Chelsea, though, wanted a 3 million pounds loan fee for Ba and eventually decided that he should stay. Lukaku, though, was preparing last night to join West Bromwich or Everton for the rest of the season. Lukaku has hoped to play a major role this season for Chelsea but Mourinho has preferred Torres and has added the option of Eto'o.
Chelsea were always adamant that Torres would stay and Mourinho was determined to keep Juan Mata, despite interest yesterday from Paris St-Germain. As well as Lukaku, Mourinho was intending to loan out -Nathaniel Chalabah for the season. Victor Moses was loaned to Liverpool yesterday while Sam Hutchinson has moved to Vitesse Arnhem. Mourinho has recruited Eto'o, Andre Schurrle, Willian, Marco van Ginkel and Mark Schwarzer this summer at an outlay of almost 70 million pounds.
Like Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur had also completed their incoming transfer business before deadline day although there was late interest in signing Thomas Ince from Blackpool and Hulk from Zenit St Petersburg. It is understood that Spurs did enquire about Hulk, but were quoted a 10 million pounds fee for a season-long loan. It meant -Roberto Soldado, Emmanuel Adebayor and Jermain Defoe would almost certainly remain as the three senior strikers.
Spurs were also preparing to allow some of their squad out on loan and were in talks last night with QPR over Tom Carroll and Benoit Assou-Ekotto. There was also positive news for Spurs yesterday on Etienne Capoue, who bruised an ankle in the 1-0 defeat against Arsenal on Sunday and will be out for four weeks. It had been feared that Capoue had damaged his fibula when he fell awkwardly while challenging for the ball with Santi Cazorla and needed oxygen as he left the pitch on a stretcher.
Capoue is set to miss France's World Cup qualifiers against Georgia and Belarus this month, and Spurs' Premier League games against Norwich, Cardiff and Chelsea.
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