Sunderland reportedly winning the race for West Ham’s Divin Mubama is a story that screams missed opportunity. Here’s why West Ham might be dropping the ball on this young striker.
Proven Track Record: Mubama’s impressive stats at youth levels showcase his potential. West Ham not giving him a proper chance in the first team seems like a missed chance to develop a homegrown talent.
Contract Conundrum: The inability to agree on a contract extension raises questions. Were West Ham’s offers lacking ambition, or is Mubama seeking a clearer path to first-team football elsewhere?
Sunderland Swooping In: Sunderland’s interest highlights Mubama’s potential. West Ham letting him go on a free transfer, even with tribunal compensation, is a loss of a potentially valuable asset.
Development Dilemma: West Ham might regret not nurturing Mubama’s talent. His potential success elsewhere could come back to haunt them, especially if he thrives at Sunderland.
Overall, West Ham’s decision to let Mubama leave raises concerns about their commitment to youth development. While they’ll get some compensation, losing a highly-rated prospect like Mubama could be a significant setback in the long run.
Sorry, Simon, but I disagree.
If Divin doesn’t want to stay and fight for his future at West Ham, or if he has ideas of grandeur that are not aligned with reality, then we should absolutely let him go.
Proven Track Record: there is very little proof that he can cut it at Premier League level. Youth football is a totally different thing. His stats do exactly that – showcase his potential – but it’s only potential. It was up to him to take his chance, and I personally didn’t see enough from him when that chance arose.
Contract Conundrum: We’ll never know what the specifics of the contract negotiations are, so it’s pointless conjecture. I trust the club to negotiate in its (and therefore our) best interests.
Sunderland Swooping In: It’s Sunderland, who are at the level he may do well at. Fair play to them, and good luck to him. It’s only a ‘loss’, and he’s only a ‘valuable asset’ if he is of use to the person who owns the asset. We’re not seeing any value in him, so he’s just an ‘asset’ that we should rightfully receive compensation for.
Development Dilemma: Yeah, I get that, but it’s true of all the other Academy players we’ve seen leave. Only Dec has really lit up the stage, and even he didn’t start with us…
If anything, the club should be looking at the quality of our Academy and asking why it is that clubs like Liverpool, City, United and Chelsea are regularly blooding youth in their first team while they’re trying to win titles, yet ours aren’t good enough to get the same chance.
We criticise the club a lot, but on this, I’m fully behind them. Good luck Divin.
Common sense as always from you, Buddy, i couldn’t agree more with everything you have said. This constant club bashing doesn’t reflect the reality and in my mind that is that the club is doing brilliantly, certainly compared to at any time in my supporting lifetime, which is over 40 years. There isn’t one example of them getting a contract issue with a youth player wrong.
Should he go to Sunderland it will be the managers fault for not giving him the opportunity to prove himself in the first team unlike Phillips who is a walking disaster I believe Munbama will become a top player given the chance it’s a shame Moyes can’t see that along with the owners just typical of how the powers that be are totally oblivious to the talent we have in the academy most teams would not allow a situation like this to happen be a sad day should he leave for Sunderland
Mubama did well in his early years, when he clearly made the most of his physical advantages, but I have watched him live for both the u18s and u21s over the past 18 months and I can assure you he has not justified any more “chances” than he has been given. To suggest that Moyes, who sees him in training every day, has somehow failed to spot some great talent is just uninformed nonsense.
He is not 20 until later this year so may still go on to develop into a Premier League player but at present he is a million miles away. Any contract offer should reflect that and if Divin disagrees then so be it, he can move on.
If he was that good he would be in the team
… along with all the other Academy players that Moyes has brought through, you mean?🙄
Who has he let go who has gone onto better things?
It’s telling that all the youth players who have gone elsewhere have:
A. Not gone to better clubs than West Ham, have not been linked to better clubs than West Ham, and apart from Ashby have not even gone to clubs as good as us.
B. None are making a name for themselves since leaving, or at least not to the extent that ‘big’ clubs are being linked to them now. That is very telling.
I wish Mubama well. He looked as if he had something about him at the top level when he broke into the first team last season but he has really disappointed this season.
The only time we can say we have let a ‘prized’ youngster go is when they make it at a similar or higher level than us IE top 10 Prem at the moment.
Given the need for home grown players in a squad, any/most Prem teams would have been snapping up our youngsters if they were good enough. If Sunderland, a club that is struggling given its size, is the only team coming in for Mubama it suggests most/all clubs have question marks over him. A shame, I would love to see him succeed.
Perhaps the question should be why are we not seeing more of other members of last season’s U21s league winning team breaking into the first team. You would think some would…….the telling point will be the next couple of seasons.
Good day folks,
Thanks for this article highlighting this very painful matter.
One of my points exactly – Moyes’ total disregard for our young talent, which goes with his inability to understand the game and produce a consistently successful team/club.
So if the club took years to produce the Mubama’s and the Johnson’s etc. How long will it now take to replace them.
In this era, it should be our pride and joy to see these boys performing on the big stage.
Just look at the 2x youngsters scoring hatricks this week for the great Man City and Chelsea teams.
Come on WH, fight to keep these boys, and lose Moyes and company.
😂😂 Simon, did you really mean this?
“ Moyes’ total disregard for our young talent, which goes with his inability to understand the game and produce a consistently successful team/club.”
1. If they are good enough, they play. Ask Declan, our previous captain. Divin is not currently good enough.
2. Moyes has 1000+ games under his belt, is lauded by his contemporaries and is still employed by EUFA as a technical advisor. I would suggest you look closer to home for the person displaying an “inability to understand the game”!
3. Our first trophy in 43 years would, to most people, be accepted as evidence of success and 3 successive years in Europe for the first time in our history seems pretty consistent.
Constructive arguments are always welcome. Clichéd nonsense just invites derision.
I’m no fan of moyes. The sooner he’s gone the better is my take on him
But to be fair there’s not one youngster who he’s let go recently ewho’s pulling up any trees wherever they’ve ended up.
Ashby at Newcastle, the boy Ngakia ( sorry for the spelling)
Diangana to West Brom. And even Hugill, who admittedly he bought then got shot of.
It’s tough predicting if they’ll be any good but there’s 4 there he got right.
And I’m categorically NOT In his camp!