Everton owner claims Romelu Lukaku didn’t sign new contract because of “voodoo”

"He got the message that he needs to go to Chelsea."

Romelu Lukaku refused to sign a new contract with Everton because a "voodoo" message told him to join Chelsea, according to Farhad Moshiri, Everton's major shareholder. Moshiri was speaking at Everton's AGM on Tuesday evening, and he discussed how Lukaku departed the club last summer. The Belgian striker joined Manchester United from the Merseyside team in a deal worth £75m before the season started. His contract at Everton was due to expire in 2019, and he refused the offer of a new deal at Goodison Park. Lukaku's agent Mino Raiola claimed in December 2016 that the new contract was "99.9 percent done", but the 24-year-old rejected the offer and Everton were forced to cash-in. "We offered him a better deal than Chelsea and his agent came to Finch Farm to sign the contract," Moshiri said at Everton's AGM.

"He said he was on a pilgrimage in Africa or somewhere and he had a voodoo and he got the message that he needs to go to Chelsea."

https://twitter.com/_pauljoyce/status/950819006960799745 https://twitter.com/GregOK/status/950816961042239489 https://twitter.com/_pauljoyce/status/950844171136495616 Lukaku was heavily linked with a move to Chelsea, but ended-up at United, where he has scored 10 goals in 21 Premier League appearances this season. Moshiri said they offered him an "unbelievable" amount of money to stay, understood to be around £140,000 a week, but the player was determined to leave. https://twitter.com/_pauljoyce/status/950807327732576256

"The issue with Romelu was not financial. As long as I am major shareholder financial issues are irrelevant. I wasted two summers to keep him: first summer with his agent, him and his family we managed to keep him. Last summer we offered him a better deal than Chelsea, whatever they offered we matched but he just didn't want to stay. If I tell you what we offered him you wouldn't believe it but they offered him a better deal."

Moshiri also suggested that Paul Pogba, Lukaku's friend and United teammate, was influential in him ending-up at Old Trafford.

"I got close to Rom, I like the boy, he's a good boy, and I used all my charm to keep him and I flatly failed," he said.

"Ultimately we lost money. To buy Rom now would be 120-million. The issue was his brain had gone. He was in LA (with Pogba) and he wouldn't come back. It happens. Alex Ferguson got another year out of (Cristiano) Ronaldo but then he was off. (Luis) Suarez had to bite a few players to get off."