By Sean Whetstone
West Ham’s head of recruitment, Rob Newman, looks a likely departure from the club following the arrival of new Technical director Tim Steidten.
Reading through the lines of the club statement in which the new man is welcomed only Newman has been left out out in the cold.
David Moyes, Mark Noble and of course David Sulivan are all quoted but Newman is entirely absent and it is difficult to see how he can remain in a job now effectively filled by Steidten.
On the face of it surely it is a matter of time before West Ham announces that the club have parted with the head of recruitment by mutual consent.
If that turns out to be the case Newman will become the scapegoat and sacrificial lamb for the failure of last summer’s transfer dealings.
The West Ham board were unhappy with the return on their investment of £165m, so either Newman or Moyes needed to take responsibility.
Moyes saved his job by avoiding relegation and winning a European trophy which left Newman in the hot seat,
Newman will get a pay off for terminating his contract early and will most likely land a new role soon.
I am sure Newman will get the bullet but I continue to be baffled by this so called “disastrous” transfer window last summer. It seems to b based on an assumption that all transfers will fire with all players adapting instantly to the PL. This rarely if ever happens at any club. Bowen took at least a season to adjust to the PL. Parqueta is now a sought after player aft er his strong showing after adjustment. Agurd, despite being hit by injury has shown himself to be a quality recruit. Emerson grew in strength over the season and started ahead of Cresswell in Prague. Downs did everything a bargain low cost recruit could be expected to do, including some important contributions in Europe, Kehrer again grew in strength as the season progressed and has probably forced Johnson out of the club. Even Danny Innes scored a crucial couple of goals against Forest without which our season would have looked very different and more importantly seemed to stiffen up Antonio’s performances with the competition for places. This leaves Scamacca and Cornet who have barely played because of injury, who nevertheless when they have played have shown occasional flashes of what could be possible. Scamacca in particular was important in some of the early European rounds. Scamacca has not proven himself in the PL and if rumours are correct may not be happy but to dismiss his possibility of becoming a good PL player is far too early to judge on the few games he has played. So I make that every player a qualified success apart from the 2 who have spent most of the season injured. Disaster – what disaster? Compared to West Ham recruits like Vlasic Anderson Haller et all it seems an amazing quality window to me.
So I amke that every transfer a success apart from the 2 players who hav