Spurs chairman Daniel Levy has got exactly the deal he wanted with the signing of Mohammed Kudus from West Ham.
After all the talk of transfer standoffs and financial impasses, Tottenham have landed an excellent player—for below market value. It’s a move that’s left West Ham fans with a familiar, sinking feeling.
Losing Declan Rice to Arsenal was painful, but at the time, £100m spread over 18 months felt like solid business. West Ham were still in Europe, the squad was relatively strong, and optimism was higher. This feels different.
Kudus may be coming off a disappointing season, but the Ghanaian clearly has world-class potential. If he finds form in North London and West Ham struggle, this transfer will become increasingly difficult to stomach.
What makes it worse is the buyout clause saga. Inserted when Kudus arrived from Ajax, the £85m clause was supposed to protect the club. Instead, it’s been largely ignored in practice, as Tottenham have managed to secure the player for significantly less.
It’s hard not to view this transfer as symbolic of West Ham’s current state. A top talent heading out the door to a direct rival, in a deal that feels more like surrender than canny negotiating.
Graham Potter now has a massive job on his hands—not just rebuilding the team, but rebuilding morale. Because right now, Spurs have landed a player who could boost their season—and West Ham look like a club in retreat before the campaign has even begun.
I think many of the comments here sum up what many of us think. It’s a deal that will help us rebuild. The Kudus of last year we did well to get 55m for. Only problem is if they manage to get the Kudus from 23/24 season, then it’s cheap. Let him go, get money to buy young dynamic players who want to play for us and look more like the Brighton model.
Sick of all the doom and gloom, I think Hammers fans and bloggers are some of the most negative around
What were we supposed to do? Risk losing the one bid we had? Not like there was a queue to sign him. Liverpool interest never happened. Newcastle signed Elanga. Arsenal going for Madueke. All of them decided not to bid.
Take the money, reinvest and move along. And have some hope Hammers
Good to see some common sense comments. It must be the name 😁.
Has anyone thought about west broms tom fellows he is surely prem class and albion are always wanting cash and possibly only 9 or 10 million
Well I’m sorry but with what I’m reading about this Barcleys bank loan and now selling Kudus to spurs we’re entitled to be angry. I dont won’t to sell ANY PLAYER to Tottenham, it’s as simple as that. It shows we have zero ambition and are being run by clowns. Market value or not.
Sniffy, clearly you don’t understand the nature of the Barclays facility so best you don’t worry about it. Ignore the keyboard scaremongers, it’s standard business practice.
Time will tell but I suspect we will be the winner when his bad attitude returns. Thomas Frank won’t stand for his petulance and if he responds like he did to Potter and Lopetegui he will be in the reserves.
I expect like he was for us a good first season after that though will he drop his levels ?
He is competing with Brennan Johnson for a place who is arguably more consistent than Kudus and gets more assists.
West Ham have sold to a “direct rival” there’s a deluded statement if IV ever read one
You’re right, it’s delusional to think spurs are anywhere near as massive as West Ham
I hear the phrase ‘below market value’ all the time and most of the time it’s wrong just like in this case. Kudos is worth 55 mill because that is what someone/the market is willing to pay for him. It is what he’s worth.
If he had played like Cunha/Mbuemo then if he had gone on offer at 55 Mill then his price would have been bid up to market value. Market Price is also dictated by how many people are willing to bid.
Yes he said he wanted to go to Spurs blahblah this ‘affects the price’ but the reality is that if he had had a great season he would have been spoiled with other offers and would have had his pick.
He is correctly priced IMO
Maybe he will be amazing and turn Into a 90 mill player which apparently is near his ‘market price.’ Absolutely no chance.
Joao pedro cost £60m from Brighton to Chelsea. In his two seasons at the seagulls he averaged either a goal or an assist every other game. A much better return than our supposed starboy achieved in his two seasons with us. So £55m seems market value on comparison. Yes he had a release cause but it was never going to be feasible unless Man City or Liverpool came knocking. Despite his first season and a couple of wonder goals il be happy to see him go. He reminds me of that kid from the school playground who never passed then always lost the ball, then was never allowed to play with the group anymore for being a ball hogger. Almost like he has the attitude of thinking he’s better than anyone else in the team. I for one hope Somerville and Guilherme shine and make us forget who kudus ever was. Hopefully now we can get some signings over the line and crack on and let potter implement his vision.
Is it below market value ? He impressed the season before last but last season he gave every impression of having been rumbled by two and three man on him quickly marking. He repeatedly ran into brick walls and showed few ideas how to counter it. Last seasons performances weren’t a £50m player.
There was little interest also suggests not below market value.
He’ll be a good player for spurs, but for us he flattered to deceive. All the fancy footwork in the world is meaningless without an end product and it wasn’t happening for him last season.
Shambles from Sullivan, another Burnley riot on his hands at this rate and only himself to blame
To many members of the board think they are gods gift to football making bad decisions and you have ahave to ask why did declan rice and Muhammad kudos senced bad vibes the management
I think the way the club is run is a complete farce and until we get new owners it will never change. I was hoping for more money from the sale but players are valued against other player sales and when Elanga for example was sold for just over 50 million ( who had a better season ) we were never going to get more than 60 million even if Say Chelsea had come in for him. Its now what business we do with the money which in all honesty that really concerns me with Sullivan negotiating
Let’s move on and sign players too slow in this window
At only £55m you would think that there would be a queue of top teams bidding for him if they thought he was a top talent. As there was only Spurs, and no reports of a sell on clause, I think we can assume West Ham and the top teams think he is one of many one season wonders.
Right now we’re going to have to trust Potter’s ability as a coach.
If you asked a West Ham fan for a prediction for the upcoming season, I’m sure it would be a lower half finish, probable relegation fight.
The board, as it is, seems not to care.
I hope I’m wrong on this.
The squad desperately needs bolstering with Potter’s choices.
Poor recruitment, in hindsight, last season. Coupled with Moyes small, aging squad from the previous season, is pretty much unforgivable oversight by the board.
A DOF was an important step to modernising the club, but it seems the dinosaurs running the show have a little life left in them, and a DOF was not to be.
While every other club seems to modernise with new stadium, training facilities and structure. West Ham sell the family silver for pence instead of pounds.
So, either Sullivan is expecting a near future take over of the club, and doesn’t want to invest his own money. Or, we have to face facts, and the board has no policy or plan for the club.
Which either way, leaves us rudderless in an ocean of pirates, like Levy.
It is a strange one as clearly West Ham could have said “you’re going nowhere” unless the buy out clause is met.
Why have they let him go so easily? Does Potter not rate him? Is he a disruptive influence in the dressing room? Or is it that he was the most obvious candidate to raise funds to kick start Potter’s rebuild?
Based on his contribution last season it is a good price…….. but if he rediscovers his form from the previous season Spurs have got a bargain. Time will tell.
in his time with west ham sullivan has turned us into a selling club, but unlike brighton, bournemouth or brentford who are selling clubs we seem to make small and modest profits or in most cases no profit atall or more likely losses, he likes the idea of money coming in from sky etc big crowds but he seems more intent on taking out rather that putting in, i wont be going back while hes in charge, even when we won the conference he was on the pitch i was thinking at one stage the dwarf was gonna collect the cup rather than rice, how on earth has this little rodent been allowed to stay at our great club for so long is a complete mystery his promises have just been lies, leaving upton park was just one big lie, the kudus sale ok we made a modest profit but the dwarf has made our great club look stupid wich greatly offends, does he have no pride in himself or our great club allowing levy to take us to the cleaners after the dwarf stated transfers were off between us and tottenham, we know the dwarf is gonna sell us at some stage the sooner the better we just need him out of our great club, let the protests begin
Selling club?
Old West ham yes
Recent seasons definitely not
Check your facts before looking through rise coloured glasses
6th highest spenders in recent years
Time to say something positive Gonzo!
Well, Martin sort of did by suggesting Guilherme and Summerville will get their chance.
Personally, I need to see some inbound players to get overly positive ahead of the season.
I see Roma are reportedly interested in Mazropanous! He’s clearly not a PL centre back so best for both parties if he moves on and we might keep the odd clean sheet next season and improve defensively. Only need a 20 goal a season striker and we’ll be mid table by Christmas! I did try but more likely the player’s brought in will be no better than the last intake and we’ll waste every penny, again! Even the law of averages should ensure a change of luck at some point!
“Then, like my dreams, they fade and die” perfectly sums up what it is to be a West Ham fan. We flirt with windows of opportunity to move to the next tier in ambition, earnings and attractiveness, then squander it to remain a mid-table club that occasionally flirts with relegation.
I get that it’s a big leap and takes years to achieve. I’m just wondering how long it will be before we get our next shot at becoming a regular top 8 club. Another 20 years?
It starts at the top. The leadership set the tone for the kind of club we want to be. Sadly, with Sullivan calling the shots, we’re never going to show anything other than submissive, aimless tendencies.
Agree completely, the club have failed completely to plan for and manage this transfer window.
Just totally amateur.
Giving the new inexperienced DOF no funding so no ability to do anything. Making it clear to the world we can’t buy without selling.
Any buying club will low ball and wait for the pressure to mount as here with the Kudus fee and worse to Spurs.
The pretence there was finance available which was clearly not true which is particularly poor.
Now clear communication from the club all through the window even now after this disaster. Some public reassurance would help, instead it’s all rumours and half truths.
Object lesson on how not to run a football club and to create a negative fanbase. All after the amazing opportunity of Prague to build on – smashed it all up.
Paul, how do you know that the club have “ failed completely to plan for and manage this transfer window”?
It may be going exactly as planned. It is still only 10th.July, let’s wait see who comes in and how Potter pulls it all together.
I’m sorry, but I think you’re misreading the room. I couldn’t care less about the pathetic ego battle between our chairman and theirs. Neither am I bothered about losing Kudus. He added very little last season and we need the money to make essential additions in other areas. Nor could I care less about spurs. Teams that define themselves by how well they do against another unsuccessful team are pretty pathetic. He’s hardly their final piece of the jigsaw. He’s a good player in a good team; that isn’t a good team. Can we move on and look at what we’re doing?
We have and do David, there’s loads of blogs about who is coming in.
Nailed it Gonzo!
This window has been extremely depressing and that was before Levy got Kudus with an insulting fee.
I’m still fearing relegation as we could be relying on academy players who have virtually non existent Premiership experience alongside players signed from lower level leagues.
Sullivan is gambling with our top flight status and I’m not confident the squad overhaul is going to result in us being stronger than the dismal season that just passed.
We have regressed so badly in such a short period of time. Sullivan is to blame for hiring coaches that couldn’t get the best out of players like Kudus.
I agree with every word of the article, but I do have a couple of plus points.
Firstly, whether Kudus is a good long term signing for Spurs remains to be seen. His exit from Ajax seemed to have an undertone of resentment. Last season was problematic on many fronts for our squad, and Kudus was front and centre. Perhaps, rather than send Spurs a hero, we’ve sent in Agent Kudus!
Secondly, Jarrod Bowen is a better and more effective right winger than Kudus. No more moving Jarrod around the front line to try to accommodate him.
Let’s face it, we have two very good players wanting to play right wing and Kudus will never be selected before Bowen, so let’s get over the fact we have sold to Spurs and use the money to build a team. ⚒️
It’s not below market price when no one else want to pay more….simple.
How can Potter possibly build our team with so few players I guarantee Potter will be blamed 12 games in for our poor start to the season Sullivan pushing him under the bus Relegation to follow The board will fail to see it’s those who are the promlem