West Ham has announced the signing of a young forward called Oladapo Afolayan.
The 20-year-old will join Terry Westley’s U23 squad, has been snapped up from National League club Solihull Moors, where his goalscoring exploits were attracting intense interest from a host of Premier League and Championship clubs.
The striker, who has joined on a three-and-a-half year contract for an undisclosed fee, is looking forward to pulling on a West Ham shirt.
“It’s a dream come true,” said. Afolayan, who was in the same year-group as Tammy Abraham and Dominic Solanke as a youngster at Chelsea. “I’ve worked hard to get here and I’m grateful for the opportunity.
“I started out with Chelsea and was there until I was 15, then my family moved to Canada and I was part of the Academy at Toronto FC. Then, when we moved back, I studied civil engineering at Loughborough University before the opportunity arose to join Solihull and play in the National League and it was something I couldn’t turn down.
“Now, the opportunity has come to join a Premier League club and West Ham is one which has always given youngsters opportunities to come through, as we have seen this sea
Good luck Oladapo👍
Trouble is, with exception of Rice I don’t think we would have seen as much of the youngsters this season if it wasn’t for the fact the squad is as thin as a pair of the stunted pornographers knickers.
Welcome, young man. Go get ’em!
When did this lad come on board ! Yesterday ? @ 20 he’s ready for senior football isn’t he ,
So any idea when he come on board Sybil !😉
Is strange Laz seems like he came on today but I read he is to join Westley’a U23s.
But he could end up being a shrewd singing haven’t seen him but supposedly has great pace technical can get in behind run channel’s & score.
Hope he does well w 4 on bench other day for U23s good to get more youth in & he could end up being a gem
He joined from the National League, so it does not effected transfer day.
Let’s look at spend in period since we left Upton Park. Not impressive given all the promises.
2016/17 – IN Ayew (£24m), Lanzini (£12m), Snodgrass (£12m), Fonte (£9m), Masuaku (£7m), Fernandes (£6m) TOTAL £70m
2016/17 OUT Payet (£29m), Tomkins (£12m) TOTAL £41M
NET SPEND £29M
2017/18 IN Arnatovic (£22m), Chicarito (£18M), Hugill (£10M), Haksbanovic (£3m) TOTAL £53M
2017/18 OUT Ayew (18M), Sakho (10M), Norvelt (£8m),Fletcher (£7M), Randolph (£5m), Valencia (£6m), Feghouli (£4m) TOTAL 58M
NET SPEND = -£5M
SO IN TWO YEARS SINCE LEAVING UPTON PARK OUR NET SPEND HAS BEEN £29- £5 = £24m IN TWO YEARS OR £12M PA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I doubt if your figures are accurate as you include total sums in and out when most transfers are spread out over 3 years. You also omit the fact the salaries have increased by £20m a year since we left Upton Park. Its very difficult to calculate total spend but a rival site seem to have made a decent job of it today and their figures tell a different story ie we do spend according to the size of the club its just that we do not buy players with resale figures like other clubs.
I think I read somewhere that we’d paid 2 installments totalling £7mill off of the original Ayew transfer fee, so we probably ended up with about £1mill from his resale, if that.