Romelu Lukaku will be back in the Chelsea squad for the League Cup semi-final against Tottenham on Wednesday after being fined for his recent controversial interview. Club-record signing Lukaku <a href="https://www.thenationalnews.com/sport/football/2022/01/04/romelu-lukaku-apologises-and-is-back-in-chelsea-squad-for-tottenham-semi-final-clash/" target="_blank">apologised for revealing his unhappiness</a> at Chelsea in footage released last Thursday but conducted three weeks before. The £98million ($133m) summer recruit was omitted from <a href="https://www.thenationalnews.com/sport/football/2022/01/02/chelsea-and-liverpool-play-out-pulsating-draw-at-stamford-bridge/" target="_blank">Sunday’s 2-2 Premier League draw with Liverpool</a>, but has returned to training ahead of the first leg of the cup tie at Stamford Bridge. Manager Thomas Tuchel believes Lukaku did not intend to cause such widespread damage and is determined to “clean the mess up”. “There will be some discipline actions of course and he will accept it; what happened happened,” said Tuchel. “It’s not a small thing but it’s not the biggest thing. And it does not make a comeback impossible, absolutely not. This is what we’ve proved now. “Something happened, he will be fined and of course he needs to accept it." Chelsea consider the matter now closed, with Lukaku having apologised to the club’s supporters in a video posted on the Blues’ website on Tuesday. “He apologised and is back in the squad for training," said Tuchel. "For me the most important thing was to understand and clearly understand and believe that it was not intentional. “He did not do this intentionally to create noise in front of such a big game. And it’s the very first time even he has behaved like this. “He’s very aware of what happened, and what he created, and he feels the responsibility to clean the mess up."
