In late July, a £17m player quietly slipped back into Rush Green to begin pre-season training. Curiously, he didn’t appear in a single clip on the club’s official channels. Then, out of nowhere, he popped up for a couple of cameo appearances in early friendlies… before disappearing off the face of the earth again.
The missing man? Maxwel Cornet, the original Sully Special, courtesy of Will Salthouse and Unique Sports Group.
When he featured against Stevenage on 22nd July, the travelling West Ham support summed up the situation perfectly with a tongue-in-cheek chant:
“Maxwel Cornet, we thought you were dead!”
West Ham’s Forgotten £17m Man
Now entering the final year of his contract, Cornet attracted zero interest in the transfer market. After barely kicking a ball during multiple loan spells, nobody seems quite sure what Nuno intends to do with him or whether he even fits into the squad at all.
And as Gonzo reported yesterday, there are suggestions within the club that talks are underway to terminate the player’s contract by mutual consent.
Will Salthouse: Agent of Maxwel Cornet
On paper, Cornet is versatile: left-back, left midfield, centre-forward, even right wing. But his recent injury list reads like a medical bingo card, “muscle fatigue”, “muscle strain”, “abductor pain”, “muscular problems”. And with no official update from the club, plus the fact he’s not even getting minutes for the U21s, the situation feels stranger by the week.
Cornet Is Already Halfway Out The Door
For a player who was reportedly earning £65k a week, which would have halved now the club are in the Championship, a solution needs to be found. Cornet isn’t just off-form. He’s off-grid! And by all accounts he’s already halfway out the door.
Who knows what might have been if his last minute equaliser against Chelski hadn’t been wrongly disallowed very early on in his Hammers career.
Since joining West Ham in 2022, his injury history has been remarkably persistent:
2022/23: calf injury, roughly 152 days out / 31 matches missed
2023/24: hamstring injury, another month out
2024/25: muscular problems and then an 81-day muscle injury
2025/26 at Genoa: seven separate injury/fitness problems, totalling roughly 221 days and 21 matches missed.
And these aren’t all isolated knocks. There’s a definite pattern of calf, hamstring, thigh/adductor and general muscular problems. Almost makes me sorry for the bloke.
Not keen on the way you talk about him, Seems like you have forgotten that he is a human being transfers don’t always work out however i have never heard him complain or make demands after all we signed him paid for him and said we would be happy to pay him a wage until July 2027. But somehow its all his fault….just a bad transfer for all parties
No Hammers fan should ever forgive him for the way he pushed his way to the front of ALL the photos from our glorious night in Prague, keen to let the world know he had been an absolutely vital part of that night. Every photo, there he is, front and centre. Be gone !
That is shocking click bait I thought this site was better than that .