Ipswich Town Sign Serbia International Sasa Lukic from Fulham

Ipswich Town’s Premier League return has taken on a far more seasoned look. The newly-promoted club have completed the signing of Serbian midfielder Sasa Lukic from Fulham on a contract running until 2030, a statement confirmed on Saturday.

The fee remains officially undisclosed, but the move is understood to be worth around £9 million, according to The Athletic.

For a club stepping back into the top flight, it is a significant outlay on a player built for the Premier League tempo rather than one merely aspiring to it.

At 29, Lukic arrives with a weight of experience that Ipswich have been keen to add. He has collected 62 caps for Serbia and came close to the 100-game mark in the Premier League with Fulham, a body of work that tells its own story about reliability at the highest level.

His route to Portman Road has been a steady climb. Lukic made his name in Serie A with Torino, growing into a central figure in Turin before a loan spell with Levante in Spain added another layer to his game. From the tactical discipline of Italy to the technical demands of La Liga and the intensity of England, he has seen most of what elite football can throw at a midfielder.

Now he returns to a ground he already knows.

“I have played at Portman Road before in the Premier League and the atmosphere was one of the best I have experienced. I can't wait to play here as a home player,” Lukic said. For a club that feeds off its home support, those words will land well.

He was equally clear about what Ipswich are getting.

“I am a box-to-box player who gives my all every time I am on the pitch and I'm excited to meet everyone and get started,” he added. It is exactly the sort of profile a newly-promoted side crave: energy, range, and a willingness to cover every blade of grass.

Lukic is not an isolated addition but part of a broader rebuild. He becomes Ipswich’s eighth signing of the close-season as the club methodically strengthens ahead of a first campaign back in the Premier League. The volume of business underlines the scale of the step up – and the determination not to be overwhelmed by it.

All of this unfolds under new leadership. Gary O’Neil, appointed in June after Kieran McKenna’s five-year spell in charge came to an end, has been tasked with keeping Ipswich in the division and shaping a squad that can do more than simply survive. O’Neil’s reputation was forged on making a relegation-threatened side competitive; now he has a Serbia international in his engine room to help repeat the trick.

Ipswich know what the Premier League can do to a thin squad. With Lukic signed until 2030, they are betting that proven experience in the middle of the pitch is the foundation that keeps them there.