No sooner has one transfer window closed than the West Ham recruitment team, headed by newly appointed Kyle Macaulay, is getting down to work preparing for the next. Reports already coming to light start to link the Hammers with possible summer signings simply because there will be the second half of a squad rebuild to complete. The squad was depleted under Moyes and agéd under Lopetegui – several players are out of contract or past their Premier League sell by dates and, on top of the existing deficiencies, will need replacing as well.
So hearing that West Ham are linked with ‘white elephants’ such as Rasmus Hojlund already is neither surprising nor unduly worrying. The concern would be if the management arrive ‘cold’ at the summer window without a succession plan for the first team already in place. Manchester United’s young £72 million striker has done nothing to suggest he’s worth of a serious bid but certainly worthy of consideration along with any other talent for nurturing under Potter’s coaching regime.
The hope will be that Evan Ferguson thrives under Graham Potter and wants to stay – Brighton will be licking their lips at the prospect of a bidding war with other Premier League clubs if he does grab half a dozen goals between now and the end of the season, so West Ham are simply trying to get themselves in a strong position instead of being held to ransom over the only striker on their radar come August.
The positive sign – post Steidten – is that most players linked to the club are young – teens or early twenties being the bulk – so past mistakes won’t be repeated. Daniel Cummings from Celtic is likely to be on board in the Summer- but again he is one for the future rather than one ready to go straight into the starting XI. Which explains the reports of interest in 22 year old Hojlund. Quite confidence inspiring – although the small shadow on the horizon is how the Hammers plan to fund their rebuild- but that’s for another day.
No doubt Hojlund has skills but one of the deal breakers with players from the bigger clubs is wages. Nobody likes to take a cut in pay, but players have to be realistic, and wages should reflect potential returns rather than time in the job. Unlike most jobs, experience counts for little when your knees are shot (Zouma).
Steidten is well known for securing young talent, so I don’t think our problem of signing ageing players is gone after he left…. Sullivan wants affordable, British, PL proven goalscorers. With those filters activated you only get 30+
Didn’t our youth team win the a cup in 2023?..There are plenty of options..I was shocked that we put a £33 million bid in for an 18 y from the French second division!.. Would he really be better than what we have?…Do we not have a system in place to nurture our home grown talent?…Is it just about who puts in the effort in during training?…We all know very young players can be erratic week in week out… Just feel that whoever is running our academy should put a work ethic in place…. Similar to the Man United model under Ferguson…….He didn’t get lucky…He installed a mentality in the Beckham’s..Scholes etc which lasted for years….The building blocks start at youth level…Under Potter hopefully this will happen.
What crap , hjoland give it a rest it is under inspiring , as for Ferguson we should have had at least an option . If he does well he’s going to be £40 million plus . No ambition from Sullivan as usual
what crap. Brighton would have been idiots to give us an option. was never going to happen, as explained more than once in previous articles. this is the only way a loan was going to work for both parties. nothing to do with Sullivan, for once. he’s under inspiring at Manure, but like others, might thrive at a club that suits him better – as explained in the article if any of it managed to permeate your skull. getting sick and tired of reading vitriol from our fans aimed at those who write the articles for you. spoilt child
Brighton apparently quoted West Ham £90m if they wanted an option to purchase in the contract. Not sure how legitimate that is but, if true, it’s obviously understandable why West Ham chose not to pursue having that in the contract.
Would also explain why of “20 clubs” (apparently) enquiring about Ferguson’s availability, none of them were making serious attempts at bringing him in.
Wug is your source for this mythical £90m quote?
Firstly, I said “apparently” regarding it, questioned the legitimacy of it and literally used “if true” so making out like I claimed it as fact makes you come across as a tad slow. Secondly, the reason is obvious for the doubt- it was Hammers News.
Here’s the quote from the article titled “West Ham suffer crushing Evan Ferguson blow as pressure piles on board”…
“They can’t get Ferguson permanently,” a source close to the deal exclusively told Hammers News.
“Tony Bloom (Brighton’s owner) has quoted them £90m.”
Decent player at the wrong club and that is down to the agent its money first sod the player….at his age going to Manure was always going to be hard and he clearly has talent but the pressure playing for the club like that is showing and it will increase further as there lack of success goes on… But if he came on the market in the summer there will be no shortage of takers.
I’m hoping that Potter can sniff out talent like ‘Arry did with the likes of Hartson, DiCanio, Wanchope, Berkovic etc. There’s always an element of risk with any transfer, but if you have the right foundations in place then he will be able to convert individual jigsaw pieces into a proper team unit. The elephant in the room though may always be Sullivan, but I am ever the optimist.
Hojlund reminds me a bit of Tore Andre Flo back when he signed for Rangers.
When Rangers paid £12m for him back in 2000 people thought it was insane (it’s still a Scottish transfer record 25 years later) and people made out like he was a flop despite a pretty decent return of 38 goals in 72 matches.
Hojlund’s record of 23 in 73 isn’t setting the world ablaze and for the £72m fee you can easily argue more is expected but Utd are playing some awful football these days but it does look like he’s got something to him so if we could land him around £40m it might be a decent signing? (Depending on the amortisation rules counting initial fee or add-ons, then £40m might count as a small profit to Man Utd if the initial £64m counts based on the 5 year contract)