Striker Britt Assombalonga has joined Middlesbrough from Nottingham Forest in a deal believed to be around £15million.
The 24-year-old was also the subject of interest from Premier League side Burnley but the Clarets were unwilling pay as much as Gary Monk’s Championship side.
Forest said the Teeside club met the buy-out clause in Assombalonga’s contract and the player completed his medical and put pen to paper at the Riverside Stadium on Monday night (July 17).
Assombalonga leaves Forest after three seasons at the City Ground and scored 14 goals last term in a side that narrowly escaped relegation on the last game of the season.
The DR Congo international joined the Reds from Peterborough United in a deal worth around £5.5m in 2014 under former boss Stuart Pearce and, in his first season, Assombalonga netted 15 times – including two against Derby.
Posh are expected to get a 20 per cent cut of the deal.
It is not clear how much the Reds will receive up front or how much the club will be paid in add-ons.
A Forest spokesman said: “Middlesbrough FC outbid various other clubs to sign Britt Assombalonga. As a club we felt that since the fee agreed met the buyout clause in his contract and he wanted to move it would be wrong to stand in his way.”
Assombalonga said: “I would like to thank Nottingham Forest for all their help and support especially whilst I was injured. They have shown full commitment to me to continue but I felt that this was too good an opportunity for me to pass up at this stage of my career.”
The striker missed virtually the whole of the 2015/16 season through injury but netted on the final game of the season in a 3-2 win away to MK Dons.
It is believed Reds boss Mark Warburton has drafted a list of strikers to replace Assombalonga.
Fans have since reacted to the news.
A Notts TV poll asked fans if they thought the deal represented a good piece of business, selling Assombalonga for nearly three times as much the club paid to Peterborough, or if it represented a lack of ambition: selling another of the club’s prized assets following the departures of Michail Antonio to West Ham in September 2015, Oliver Burke to Real Leipzig in August 2016 and Henri Lansbury to Aston Villa in January.
Following 131 votes, 89 per cent of fans voted in favour of the move representing good business.
