Quite why the Hammers don’t simply come out and reveal that Jesse Lingard will be hoping the club again is ridiculously unclear.
As fully expected they have submitted a squad of just 24 to the Premier League which they have now posted on the official site at www.whufc.com which, let’s be honest, gives the play the nod as he can koin at any time as a free agent.
And the only serious reason why they have failed to give the full compliment of 25 to the League is because they are waiting to add Lingard who by the way can now not take part in the Europa League.
Each Premier League squad must contain up to 25 players, including no more than 17 players who do not fulfil the Home Grown Player (HGP) criteria. The rest of the squad, up to a total of 25 players, must be home grown.
The announcement reveals that eight home grown players are Michail Antonio, Jarrod Bowen and Danny Ings, defenders Aaron Cresswell and Ben Johnson, midfielders James Ward-Prowse and Conor Coventry and goalkeeper Joseph Anang.
The addition of Lingard later which seems inevitable will bring that to nine.
The Hammers have named an additional list of Under-21 players who are eligible over and above the squad limit of 25 players. For the 2023/24 campaign, Under-21 players will have been born on or after 1 January 2002.
Squad players (*Home grown)
Nayef Aguerd
Edson Álvarez
Joseph Anang*
Michail Antonio*
Alphonse Areola
Saïd Benrahma
Jarrod Bowen*
Maxwel Cornet
Vladimír Coufal
Conor Coventry*
Aaron Cresswell*
Łukasz Fabiański
Pablo Fornals
Danny Ings*
Ben Johnson*
Thilo Kehrer
Mohammed Kudus
Konstantinos Mavropanos
Angelo Ogbonna
Emerson Palmieri
Tomáš Souček
Lucas Paquetá
James Ward-Prowse*
Kurt Zouma
U21 players (Contract and Scholars)
Dondre Abraham, Dondre
Chukwuemeka Adiele
Joshua Ajala
Tyron Akpata
Billy Bates
Ryan Battrum
Sebastian Boothe
Joshua Briggs
Gabriel Caliste
Kaelan Casey
Daniel Chesters
Regan Clayton
George Earthy
Favour Fawunmi
Preston Fearon
Michael Forbes
Mehmet Halim
Riley Hargan
Krisztián Hegyi
Finlay Herrick
Liam Jones
Patrick Kelly
Jacob Knightbridge,
Gideon Kodua
Levi Laing
Callum Marshall
Ezra Mayers
Jethro Medine
Sean Moore
Divin Mubama
Thierry Nevers
Luizão
Lewis Orford
Rayan Oyebade
Freddie Potts
Daniel Rigge
Junior Robinson
Oliver Scarles
Elisha Sowunmi
Kamarai Swyer
Sean Tarima
Mason Terry
Jemiah Umolu
Blaise Uwandji
Archie Woods