Rondon claims Irons never made a “proper offer”

Salomon Rondon has revealed that he spent a lot of time waiting for the Irons to move in on him this season.

But when they did West Brom found the offer of £10 million-plus Jordan Hugill and Sam Byram unacceptable.

The striker had been on the Irons’ wanted list at the time they were hunting Maxi Gomez and although it was mooted they were likely to go back in with an improved offer it didn’t happen.

Instead, they become more and more involved in a bid for the Uruguayan striker whilst Rafa Benitez – who had Rondon on loan at Newcastle last season – pestered the player to join him in China.

He also remained on a Hammers shortlist’ of two with Fulham’s Aleksander Mitrovic but instead, the board threw all the finance they had available at Sebastien Haller whilst Rondon finally decided to take the same journey as  Mark Arnautovic and joined Benitez in the orient.

Now, Rondon has commented on the situation and admits he delayed all plans as he waited for a “proper offer” to come in but eventually decided to move on to Dalian Yifang.

He told The Sun that the ‘proper offer” never arrived saying: “We never saw a proper offer. I was waiting to see if Pellegrini would call. I never received that call and Rafa was calling me all the time, so I chose to go to China.”

“I can play again in the Premier League one day because I am the kind of striker people like in England — scores goals, works really hard, runs, fights with the defender. But I am now thinking about Dalian with Rafa. It’s an amazing country and I am really happy,” he added.