Arriving at West Ham in the summer transfer window to wide approval, arguably West Ham’s two finest signings in recent years have been even more impressive on the pitch than the hype surrounding their arrival led fans to believe.
El Hadji Malick Diouf was virtually unknown apart from a solid Wembley performance for Senegal against England.
Mateus Fernandes was known only as a promising Southampton midfielder who’d been relegated with the Saints and deserved another shot at the Premier League: I for one hadn’t appreciated the talent he had and how much he would revolutionise West Ham’s midfield. There is so much more to come from him as well, by all accounts, from those who have watched him.
Diouf, on the other hand, has exploded onto the scene and already looks a world class player at just 20. His pace, power and booming left foot is likely to terrorise right sided defenders across the Premier League this season and he looks a bargain at under £20 million.
It now transpires that we may all be wrong to credit the summer capture
..of the duo to Kyle Macaulay and Graham Potter: According to ExWHUEmployee, (quoted by WestHamReport on twitter), ‘the credit for signing Diouf and Fernandes actually lies with Max Hahn (West Ham United’s head of Technical Recruitment and Analysis ] and his scouting team’
Whether this is true, or a case of history being re-written as soon as Graham Potter has left the building – who knows.
“Why does it matter?” – Because it has a huge bearing on future transfer window success. Max Hahn was a Steidten selection, just 29 years old and from Werder Bremen, where he was Scouting and Analysis Co-Ordinator.
West Ham paid a million to Chelsea in compensation when Head of Recruitment Kyle Macaulay joined and it had been thought – in view of his apparent involvement in identifying and securing summer targets – notably Diouf – that a million was money well spent.
At this tricky time amidst the changing of the guard between Potter’s team and Nuno’s new broom, several may be jockeying for position post-Potter. Whoever did land the big fish this summer may well give his career prospects a big boost.
I do not think it matters because Sullivan will start to plead povety so he got a excuse to sell them
I thought it would be only a matter of time. Surprised Sully hasn’t tried to take credit for two decent signings. Same thing happened under Moyes where any decent signing was supposed to be Steidten or Sully. Fact is thats what recruitment teams are for. Thats what they’re employed for but managers always have final say so on a signing. Managers get hammered for making bad signings so they should also get credit for good ones.
I hope this is true Martin. Not because of any anti Potter/Macaulay feelings but because it just means we have a long term recruitment team that can bring consistency to a selection process of young talent.
Doesn’t get over the fact we have ‘he who shall not be mentioned’ undertaking transfer negotiations but at least part of the process will be professional!
First time I’d noticed that last line about the shirt Martin, exactly the same for me – and my first shirt was around 1970.
that’d be one of the big thick cotton heavyweight long sleeved ones like mine then. think I slept in mine for a week, got it after watching gordon banks save a Geoff hurst penalty. must have been ’72 or 73.