The flurry of activity on deadline day saw several Hammers players depart to enable Carlos Soler to join the club. West Ham United hurriedly sought to complete deals for perennial bench sitter Maxi Cornet and reluctant want-away Nayef Aguerd both of whom were tied into loans on the last day of August. The slightly more controversial loanee was a hugely expensive signing just 12 months before, costing a whopping £30 million to bring him to London Stadium from Southampton – David Moyes’ “marquee’ signing of the window in 2023.
I keep expecting to hear that no sooner has James Ward Prowse switched the claret and blue for the red and white of Nottingham Forest that he’s gone and broken the free kick record we waited all last season to celebrate. But – no, everything I look at seems quiet on the ‘JWP news’ front.
Noting that Ward-Prowse got subbed off for Forest against Fulham yesterday, I took a look through a few Notts Forest fan forums just to find out what has been going on with Ward-Prowse and what Forest fans thought of their season’s loanee.
Ward Prowse hasn’t, by all accounts, set the world on fire in red and white either
forestforum.co.uk has some pretty scathing comments that seem to be vindicating our decision to loan out the Hammers midfielder:
“WardProwse has had zero impact. If we didn’t have dead balls you’d never know WP was on the field.”
Or How About:
“This is why Ward Prowse isn’t England material. He completely lacks presence in the middle of the park”
Ward-Prowse In the middle of our team …madness!
And there were plenty more unprintable ones. In fairness, many were broadly supportive but those largely came from weeks 1 and 2: It seems as though Ward-Prowse is attracting the same criticism in the Midlands as he did in East London. The ‘sideways’ football is something that does crop up in comments too and appears to be irritating some Forest spectators. Now they know what we had to put up with last year.
Early days but perhaps we need to credit Lopetegui and Steidten for a good call.
Doesn’t sound like Forest will be knocking at the door to sign the player on a permanent deal: But the season isn’t yet a quarter way through so we’ll see what Ward Prowse can conjure up.
JWP has had his day in the sun. I prefer to wish players who have been released the best, unless they behaved contemptibly (think Demetri P). JWP is poor defensively and is, as alluded to, a one trick pony. That said, decent character and hope he gets the dead-ball record.
I’m was talking about this article and it’s writer not J.W.P. which is a different matter.