After all the turmoil over the summer and the trouble that West Ham United seemed to have when it came to strengthening the group and making signings following the sale of skipper Declan Rice, the 2023/24 campaign has turned into a pretty decent one for manager David Moyes.
The 60 year old former professional centre half has seen his side turn their form around again in recent games, and now have back to back victories again in the five game form chart, after three successive defeats. This means we hold a small advantage over Newcastle United and are sat in seventh place in the Premier League table, and we are only two points off Erik ten Hag’s Manchester United side.
With the campaign quickly beginning to come to a close, and some tight clashes still left to play both teams to score betting will probably come more to the fore in future weeks, but in any event we are beginning to see more rumblings of potential summer transfer talk, and two pieces of speculation stuck out this week that may be of particular interest to Hammers fans.
The first concerns Borussia Dortmund legend Marco Reus, as it is being suggested that his time at the Westfalenstadion will come to an end at the conclusion of the current campaign. The 48 capped German international attacking midfielder has been with Dortmund for the last 12 years and has already reportedly gained a fair bit of interest from Major League Soccer and Turkish clubs, but it has also been claimed that we (and other PL clubs) have been contacted by the 34 year old’s representatives to see if we held any interest, as the player apparently wants at least one crack at the Premier League before he begins contemplating hanging his boots up on his career.
With attacking options potentially being an issue as we look towards next season, Reus’ pedigree will get fans talking, especially with him being available as a free agent. With 415 appearances across all competitions for Dortmund, he has scored 167 goals and laid on 128 assists, and his legendary status was backed up when he was made club captain.
Another potential piece of speculation that might be worth watching are claims that we have expressed an interest in Gent defender Archie Brown. The 21 year old Birmingham born defender came through Derby County’s youth system, before making the switch out to Swiss side Lausanne-Sport. With 41 league appearances, and five goals to his name for them, he made the move to Belgian side Gent in 2023 and became only the fourth Englishman to play for them. In his 19 appearances for them so far, he has certainly begun catching the eye and growing his profile.
So much so in fact, that it is now being reported that scouts from Leeds United, Chelsea and ourselves were over in Belgium last weekend to watch him in action and check up on his further progress. He apparently came through as a winger initially before being transitioned into a wing back, but he can also play as a straight left back as well, so there is some versatility there that can be further developed.
In fairness, this link sounds more like a natural scouting system just doing its job, rather than any real or firm interest from the club directly, but if the lad continues to impress for the remainder of the season, he may well be a name worth remembering if we are suitably impressed enough at the end of the season to take a small gamble and see how our coaches could bring him on further.
If any eventual deal was done though, he would be very much one for the future.
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