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Exit announced | West Ham’s public separation becomes a divorce

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The long separation could not continue- Tim Steidten had been on gardening leave since last month as Graham Potter moved seamlessly into the driving seat at West Ham. Having been marginalised for this transfer window, the writing was on the wall for Tim Steidten who professed to being ‘thrilled’ at having control of West Ham last summer.

It didn’t work out well as Steidten took the blame for West Ham’s patchwork quilt of odds and ends players built jaggedly into a squad: The oldest in the Premier League, ‘the defence that cannot defend and the midfield that cannot run’ were some of the more frank descriptions of the squad he created with Lopetegui and Sullivan throwing in their own picks along the way.

As reported on the club web site whufc.com, what was always inevitable has now become reality:”

West Ham United Football Club can confirm that Technical Director Tim Steidten will be leaving the Club. Tim has been instrumental in our recruitment efforts. With the arrival of our new Head Coach Graham Potter, who has brought in his own Head of Recruitment, it is time for Tim to pursue new opportunities. We would like to thank Tim for his dedication and hard work and wish him all the best in his future endeavours.”

And so in a few sentences an unhappy marriage of convenience is ended: Steidten has, probably unfairly, become the scapegoat for the Fullkrug and Guilherme £50 million splurge. Graham Potter and head of recruitment Kyle Macaulay will need every ounce of energy and skill if they are to negotiate their way through dealings with other clubs, David Sullivan and West Ham’s boardroom with more success than Steidten.

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From the old Bobby Moore Upper to the Billy Bonds' stand these days I've been watching since '03 and a supporter since about 1970.. 'Football is Life' oh yes. Let it raise your spirit but never darken your mood. Life's too short not to enjoy the journey with our Claret and Blue heroes n' villains.

18 comments

  • Zahama says:

    I feel that the biggest question mark against Steidten is the fact that relationships with both Moyes and JLo broke down completely – the Director of Football has to be able to get on with the Head Coach – and we can now guess that some of the negotiations with Potter were over the Director

    Also if he was such a hit at Bayer Leverkeusen why did he leave?

  • Chunk says:

    Now just need to get Dan Ashworth in to do the negotiations properly and we should start to be on our way onwards and upwards. COYI

    • Essexiron42 says:

      Good point Chunk, here’s just some of the players he recruited at Brighton and Newcastle:-

      Tariq Lamptey, Anthony Gordon, Marc Cucurella, Kaoru Mitoma, Nick Pope, Evan Ferguson, Leandro Trossard, Alexis Mac Allister, Alexander Isak, and Moises Caicedo.

      Moises Caicedo brought for £4 million, sold to Chelsea for £115 million. Kaoru Mitoma brought for £2.6 million, just had bid rejected for £54 million, Alexander Isak brought for £63 million, now valued at over £100 million, Leandro Trossard brought for £15 million, sold for £27 million. Marc Cucurella brought for £15 million, sold for £62 million.
      He also brought Evan Ferguson from Bohemians to Brighton for a nominal fee. Not a bad record!

  • John Ayris says:

    No shortage of champions league teams who will take him. Supposedly we’re not run like a circus any more….

  • Graham Watts says:

    At least with Graham Potter he has a head of recruitment he has worked with before at clubs he has managed so the mentioned conflict between manager and that role should not be a issue. Graham has already shown he is fully prepared to use our Academy players and recruit young ones. The remainder of this season is going to focus on trying things out with the early signs encouraging.

  • Chris W says:

    It seems to be a given on this site that Fullkrug is a failure but he’s hardly had a chance to be a failure (or otherwise) as he’s barely had any game time due to injury. His last couple of appearances he was looking pretty good, let’s give him a chance.

  • PB61 says:

    Said it before and I’ll say it again, the only person who should choose which players to buy and sell should be the manager.

    • JB15 says:

      There’s a reason why this doesn’t work nowadays. Manager’s can’t possibly be expected to know about generational talents in countries like Ecuador, Africa, Asia, the Middle East etc. which is where top clubs all look these days, based on statistics, analytics etc. Look at Brighton signing Mitoma, for example – £3m from a Japanese A-League team. You’re telling me the likes of Moyes would have even been aware of a player like that.

      Sure, the manager should have a say in the type of player he wants (which is usually the case), but if we had just the manager making signings, we’d miss out on a huge % of players.

      The model works when you have synergy between an owner, a manager and a Director of Football. Look at Villa with Emery and Monchi. Brighton in general. Bournemouth with Iraola and the various DoF’s they have had in the last two seasons.

  • Mick Bering says:

    Best wishes to Stiedten Deserves to go to a club where a chairman runs a club in a correct and decent way We all know where al the terrible decisions are coming from at our club

  • JB15 says:

    He never stood a chance with Sullivan’s ridiculous policy of letting the Manager sign some players (e.g. JWP, Kalvin Phillips for Moyes, Kilman for JLo), then Sullivan getting to sign a few (e.g. Summerville) and then a few for Steidten.

    It was, and is, absolutely no way to run a football club. Steidten wanted Jhon Duran, Gyokeres etc. he also wanted Amorim, not JLo. His hands were tied by Sullivan choosing not to spend money, when so much of it was wasted on the likes of Ings, Kalvin Phillips etc.

    No-one can expect every signing we make to be a huge success, but the way we operate is completely amateur. Steidten should have had sole control of transfers – his record at Leverkusen had proven what he could have done. The only failure of a transfer of his was Mavropanos who statistically, was one of the best defenders in the Bundesliga the season before we bought him.

    Guilherme is taking us down the model that every forward thinking club goes down – buying young, top talent and letting them develop. Yet that idiot Sullivan can’t see it. Bournemouth yesterday sign Kroupi and send him back out on loan. Brighton do it. Chelsea do it. Fullkrug should have been a great signing – Germany’s number 9 for less than £25m, presumably the budget he had to spend on a striker. We’d all do anything for a 33 year old Chris Wood at the moment, so Fullkrug at 31 could have had 2/3 good seasons with us.

    Sullivan is the sole cause of why we won’t progress – he’s clueless, backward thinking and unable to run a modern day football club.

    Let’s not forget, he thought JLo was a better option than Potter, despite it being blatantly obvious that Potter is by far a better fit, and runs back to him. He also thought Pellegrini was a better fit than Moyes, who he also ran back to.

    Clueless.

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