Steve Marlet is set to join Fulham after Lyon accepted a £13m bid from the Whites for the French international.
The 26 year-old is poised to have a medical at Motspur Park later today before putting pen to paper on a four-year contract with the Premiership newcomers.
The developments should end Jean Tigana’s prolonged search for a new striker with Fulham having tried and failed to land Freddie Kanoute, Jan Koller, Nwankwo Kanu, Dennis Bergkamp and Hakan Sukur over the course of the summer. Marlet, who is reported to have been offered £50,000-a-week to persuade him to join Tigana’s French revolution at Craven Cottage rather than play Champions’ League football at Lyon, has left the French squad preparing for a friendly in Chile to hold talks with Tigana.
Lyon coach Jacques Santini, already dismayed by his club’s sales of key players this summer, was desperate to hold on to one of his attacking assets but Lyon’s board believed a £9.2m profit on the forward they signed from Auxerre for only £3.8m last summer was too good to turn down.
Lyon goalkeeper Gregory Coupet is credited with telling Canal+:
“It’s a great disappointment because we’re losing a super player and a friend. Now we’re going to have to lower our goals for the season.”
