As West Ham were in the final stages of their preparation for their encounter with Millwall, social media posts, some in jest, some not so, appeared concerning one former stalwart of West Ham’s team who hasn’t been seen this season, coming on the back of recent reports over Magassa and Edson Alvarez having to do their best ‘eat humble pie’ impressions following fall outs with the apparently prickly West Ham boss.
The continual non-appearance of Alphonse Areola seemed to be occupying all sorts of Irons’ fan social media accounts, some even suggesting the Frenchman had not trained with his club yet turned up and participated in school sports days.
Alphonse Areola has been sitting out West Ham’s league and cup fixtures this season – ten games and counting
All of which sounded a little -shall we say – far fetched, so we reached out again to a source inside West Ham for the real situation, seeking confirmation of what we were told last week – was there, perhaps, more to his absence? Perhaps a falling out behind the scenes?
“He’s back in training so no issues from our side”
Was the fairly definitive response. However until the Hammers second-choice goal keeper makes a return to the bench, the stories will keep swirling and the theories will keep on surfacing.
There’s no rift. You heard it here first.