Chelsea FC: Lukaku or Morata? Who will they sign?

Chelsea FC are being linked with both Everton’s Romelu Lukaku and Real Madrid’s Alvaro Morata this summer.

But who will Chelsea FC sign? Both Lukaku and Morata are said to be keen on a move to Stamford Bridge amid speculation that Diego Costa could be leaving.

Here I will analyse the two strikers, their statistics, the rumours and who they should ultimately sign.

Romelu Lukaku Vs Alvaro Morata

Lukaku is on his way to winning the golden boot this season after scoring 21 goals for Everton already. It took awhile for him to hit form though until finally scoring with a hat-trick against Sunderland. Since then he’s been banging in goals left, right and centre.

Lukaku amazingly still has nine games left to play in the Premier League so his goal tally could easily reach 30 goals for the season.

The last striker to hit 30 goals was ex Liverpool ace Luis Suarez with 31 goals.

The Belgian forward has rejected a new contract offer from Everton and looks set on leaving and Chelsea are the favourites to sign him.

Lukaku, of course, used to play for Chelsea and is a fan of the club. He idolised Didier Drogba and would like to try replicate the Ivorian’s success for the Blues.

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The six-foot-three towering striker would add an immense physical presence for the Blues and he can hold up the ball better than Morata with winning 3.6 aerial duels per-game. While Morata has won 0.8 per-game.

However Morata and Lukaku are both impressive with scoring with their head.

Lukaku has had six assists as well this season  while having an average of 2.9 shots per-goal.

Morata meanwhile has scored eight goals and made two assists in 19 appearances with 10 being off the bench.  He has a 2 shots-per-goal ratio though which is lower but that’s because he’s scored less and played less.

Lukaku is 23-years-old while Morata is 24. They both still have huge potential.

While Lukaku is slightly bigger than Morata and stronger, Morata is a bit more agile and tends to make more runs through the defence to score while Lukaku likes to get the ball to his feet more.

Lukaku, in a way is more suited to the Chelsea FC style of play and is almost a like-for-like swap with Diego Costa.

Lukaku is also a proven goal-scorer in the Premier League and would need very little time to adjust at Chelsea FC. While Morata would potentially need more time to adjust to Premier League football and could take a season to start finding his feet.

Manager Antonio Conte could be leaning towards Alvaro Morata though as he knows him from coaching him at Juventus.

However, if you look at Morata’s goalscoring tally every year, he’s never hit the 10 goal mark. He consistently only scores around 7-8 goals per season.

While Lukaku has a much more impressive goalscoring record with 17 goals for West Brom (2012/13), 15 goals for Everton (2013/14), 10 goals (2014/15), 18 goals (2015/16) and finally 21 goals (2016/17) which could end up being a lot more.

He is one of only five players to score 50 premier league goals before his 23rd birthday. He is also now the first foreign player to score 80 before his 24th birthday.

It can be argued as well that Lukaku scores in a much harder league than the Spanish La Liga and the Serie A.

I personally prefer a move for Lukaku but the two options are dividing opinions amongst Chelsea fans.

While there are rumours that Chelsea could even pull off a miracle and sign both Morata and Lukaku.

It’s believed that should Costa go, Chelsea will have around £200m to spend in the summer.

I seriously doubt Chelsea FC could sign both, but stranger things have happened in football.

Lukaku will no doubt score more goals for Chelsea while Morata may link-up play better with Eden Hazard and Pedro/ Willian.

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I don’t think Chelsea FC should sign both as that would be a disaster unless Conte intends on playing with two central forwards which would be revolutionary in today’s game.

It seems as though Conte prefers a move for Morata though while Chelsea’s technical director Michael Emenalo has been after Lukaku for the past few seasons.

Everton value Lukaku at around £75m but reports recently say Chelsea could offer £40m plus fellow Belgian Michy Batshuayi.

Morata, meanwhile is valued at around £50m.

It’s worth spending a bit more and getting a proven premier league goal-scorer in Lukaku than getting Morata in my opinion.

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Plus, Lukaku will link up well with fellow Belgian Eden Hazard. While there are some critics of Lukaku’s first touch, Chelsea will be getting a 20-plus goals per season striker. And that’s needed if they want to replace Costa.