Transfer Speculation

ASLEFshrugged

By that measure Brooking has 3 caps

Slacker

I think Lingard ( or any pro footballer really) will go to whoever pays him the most.
Simple as that.

ASLEFshrugged

Slacker said:

I think Lingard ( or any pro footballer really) will go to whoever pays him the most.
Simple as that.

Money isn't everything.

Payet took a pay cut to go home to Marseille, Scott Parker wouldn't move outside the M25 as he wouldn't be able to pick his kids up after school, David Unsworth went to Villa cos his wife wanted to live closer to Liverpool, Le Tissier turned down a move to Spurs because he was about to get married and his fiancée didn't want to live in London.

Slacker

Of course there are exceptions but I think in general, we as fans maybe invest too much emotional attachment to players. They are hired guns and it’s a job. When they’re offered a big new contract with their current club I imagine they will weigh it up with other clubs offers before deciding.

ASLEFshrugged

I agree with that but there is more to it than just money, there's also which club is more likely to offer success with trophies and European football or at which club are you more likely to get played.

One problem we could have with getting central midfielders to join is that with Rice and Soucek in the squad they could spend a lot of time on the bench.

Fortuneseeker

ASLEF, some might accept not playing much, winning trophies and earning a lot whilst others will want to play more often & feel they have contributed to any success the club might achieve. We will definitely need a good back up CDM to play next season due to the increase in the number of games we will be playing due to our participation in Europe. SouRice can't play in every match.

jay_in_cpt

ASLEFshrugged said:

By that measure Brooking has 3 caps

By that measure most Scots,Irish,Welsh,NI's would have hardly any caps between them whatsoever!

ASLEFshrugged

Even if we don't qualify for Europe this season we're going to need a bigger squad to try again next time

John Lundstram on a free?

yoyo

Looking down the league's.... Jerry Yates, 24 years old and has scored 17 goals so far for Blackpool. He'll have scouts following him. I doubt we could loan out an under 23 player to league 1 that would score as many

WHU_Champo_league_in_7_years

Think character and attitude is very important to Moyes, think that he took chances on Lingard/Dawson because they both appeared to be players with something to prove

Don't think Moyes will ever just want to pack the squad for the sake of it, he obviously takes recruitment very seriously and doesn't want to make a mistake

But even if we do get champions league this year, I seriously doubt we'd be able to drop £100mil net on a single window etc.

I'm glad that we appear to have a good system in place

While everyone will lose their head if we sold Soucek, but say we did get somewhere between £50mil to £60mil for him, that's the type of deals we need to be bringing in...making profit on players we bring in

Easy saying we need to keep everyone here to show ambition, but Leicester won the league and still couldn't stop Kante etc. leaving...and they've gone from strength to strength by making huge amount of money on Chillwell, Maguire, Mahrez etc and investing the money correctly

Fortuneseeker

Easy saying we need to keep everyone here to show ambition, but Leicester won the league and still couldn't stop Kante etc. leaving...and they've gone from strength to strength by making huge amount of money on Chillwell, Maguire, Mahrez etc and investing the money correctly

WHU, The key four words are at the end of your comment. Would DM get all the money to reinvest in the team or would it be another case of DS using his contacts to bring in a player or two to save money?

baracks_a_hammer

Selling players is not a bad thing but you have to be good at managing the throughput of players to allow the club to progress. So if you do sell your gems then cash in good and proper. Chelsea, Liverpool and Leicester for example must be delighted at the monies they got for Hazard, Coutinho and Maguire for example. Chelsea also manage to buy players, loan them out and sell them for millions having barely played for their first team.

G&S have on the whole been terrible at it in their reign. We take a hit on so many transfers. They have put their hands in their pockets to funds transfers, but the return on what they have put in is terrible (probably negative). The players we loan out seem to derive no benefit for us at all. Now of course the recent few players coming in have been much better, but there is no option when it comes to Lingard.

If we sold, say, Soucek for £50m would that be good business? If we are talking about pre-Covid money, then I would say no. But that’s just my opinion.

OutcastLondoner

Moyes' transfer record since January last year means I have a little more belief in us not completely blowing what we'd make from selling someone like Soucek or Rice. But I'm still a bit concerned. From the way he spoke during this January, it seems he's very cautious and a bit slow on spending, which is probably fine when we have a small budget to work carefully with. Does that still work when you have a much more enhanced budget that should be buying you a replacement to fill in for Soucek plus one or two others to enhance the squad? IMO that money can't wait until a new window. I don't know if Moyes is good at spending lots of money and we know the owners aren't.

Compared to before, I'm a little less against us selling players for more because Moyes does give me some confidence but I'm still not that comfortable that we won't blow the money.

claretandbluesky

Having the money isn't the only issue as we need to be able attract better players and to sell your best is the wrong message to try and attract another player with options.

So as an example, in theory we sell Rice for 100m and would like to buy two 50m players which in theory could improve us. The problem is 50m players have options and are unlikely to choose the side who just sold their best player. If you are Liverpool or Chelsea the player will trust your recent ambition and current Champions League proximity, West ham don't have that, meaning if we enter the market to use the Rice money we could end up missing out on a lot of targets.

I prefer keeping your best and using that to demonstrate ambition to attract a better player. Lingard may be a good example. Would he sign if we sold Rice when other teams come in?

buffybegood

It's all well and good trusting Moyes to spend the money well, the problem I have is in trusting Sully to add any money from sales to what should already be in the kitty; not a chance of that happening imo.

ASLEFshrugged

We're back in Rio territory

20 years ago we had a Rolls Royce in a Ford Fiesta team with Del Boy in charge and owners who had no ambition beyond staying in the top flight

I think the difference today is Moyes, he has a lot more ambition than Arry and after Man U he wants to prove his detractors wrong.

Also I think S&G aren't in this for the money, I think they really believe that they are footballing geniuses who can get this team into Europe, win trophies, etc. and despite their obvious incompetence they have got lucky by hiring a competent manager in Moyes.

OutcastLondoner

claretandbluesky said:

Having the money isn't the only issue as we need to be able attract better players and to sell your best is the wrong message to try and attract another player with options.

So as an example, in theory we sell Rice for 100m and would like to buy two 50m players which in theory could improve us. The problem is 50m players have options and are unlikely to choose the side who just sold their best player. If you are Liverpool or Chelsea the player will trust your recent ambition and current Champions League proximity, West ham don't have that, meaning if we enter the market to use the Rice money we could end up missing out on a lot of targets.

I prefer keeping your best and using that to demonstrate ambition to attract a better player. Lingard may be a good example. Would he sign if we sold Rice when other teams come in?

Tbh claret and blue, I'd think that if we sold Rice for that much, we should be looking more for three £35m players (or less) who have been scouted properly but have the hunger to prove themselves, rather than a Haller/Anderson who have had good seasons but don't fit us. More Soucek's basically. Leicester have bought quite a few really useful players for not too much - Ndidi, Maddison, Ricardo Perreira, Castagne, Soyuncu, Tielemans.

While it still will be hard to convince some of those (e.g. Tielemans) to join, I think we can sell star players and still get that type of player.

Obviously I don't want Rice to go and we should be resisting selling both him and Soucek, at least until after the World Cup next year. Rice is still young and this season puts us in a strong position to show we can match any ambitions he might have. I think Soucek might be the first to get serious bids because he'll likely be cheaper without the English premium.

OutcastLondoner

Apparently we have our own 19-year-old Kante-like player in the academy. I hope the hype is real. It would be great to have someone like that complementing Soucek and Rice. https://theathletic.com/2457452/2021/03/19/keenan-appiah-forson-the-west-ham-youth-player-likened-to-ngolo-kante/

OldCastleSwift

OutcastLondoner said:

Apparently we have our own 19-year-old Kante-like player in the academy. I hope the hype is real. It would be great to have someone like that complementing Soucek and Rice. https://theathletic.com/2457452/2021/03/19/keenan-appiah-forson-the-west-ham-youth-player-likened-to-ngolo-kante/

I think the issue with the academy is just that; hype. I've read that both Appiah-Forson and Coventry are ready for the first team, which sounds great but we've seen nothing from either to back that up. The hope is certainly there, but for every Declan Rice there are a dozen Elliot Lee's.

Personally, I think it's too big a risk to not address the CM issue in the summer and trust to luck that either of the academy boys can step up. If we were knocking along in mid-table then there's an argument to give them both some time in the league to see if they can compete, but with us challenging for Europe Rice and Soucek have to play every minute they're available, IMO.

Ideally, I'd like us to sign a CM in the summer; someone like Kral or Choudhury who are young but still have decent top flight experience would be ideal. Rice, Soucek Kral/Choudhury and either Coventry or Appiah-Forson as back-up would give the midfield more depth, and allow whichever of the academy lads not in the squad to have a season on loan in the Championship.

Dodger58

I agree OCS that Rice & Soucek have to play every minute they're available, but would like to see Coventry and/or Appiah-Forson given the Noble role off the bench. If we were not so close to qualification for Europe, I am sure both would have more opportunity over the last few matches, but at present I think it is unlikely.

OldCastleSwift

That's a fair point Dodger. We regularly have two 'keepers on the bench so there's space for either of the young lads, but it would mean they would have to commit to the first team bubble and not feature so regularly for the U23s, who by all accounts needs all the help they can get to stay up.

OutcastLondoner

Choudhury's a good shout. Maybe could learn to play like Soucek.

alderz

I think that part of the problem with academy players atm is that they are in their own bubble, aren't they? Though I'm pretty sure Mipo switches between the two so I don't know.

I really like Choudhury. I think he's a good player and can do a bit of everything. He's a similar player to Rice, IMO (though not as good, obviously).

yoyo

Aguero definitely leaving Ciity at the end of the season. Not a bad cover for Antonio!

Cuz1

Yes he could play when Antonio’s out injured and vice versa 😂😂

ASLEFshrugged

Lost in Translation

www.hammers.news headline "West Ham reportedly want to sign Moussa Marega on a free transfer" with a link to a Portuguese website but when you follow the link and translate the report there's no mention of West Ham, rather its about Fenerbahçe. By coincidence Antony Martin, the hack who wrote the story also linked us with Marega last week. And last year. And the year before.

Several sites reporting that Belgian midfielder Hans Vanaken wants to sign with us quoting Belgian website Voetball 24 as a source but again when you follow the link its a different story. We tried to sign him in the summer but he turned us down as he didn't consider West Ham to be a step up from Club Brugge (Daily Mirror interview October 2020). The Belgian article says Vanaken would still be interested in a move to the Premier League and a move to London but not that he wants to move to West Ham specifically.

April Fools or bad journalism?

OutcastLondoner

I think that website is just a content farm, pump out stuff they know will get clicks. It's just the two of them. They've already got half a dozen articles out this morning. A lot of these football sites are the same.

ASLEFshrugged

They usually regurgitate stories from other sources but this is pure invention.

2+2= the complete works of Shakespeare

IronHerb

O Romeo, Romeo, where2+2= art thou Romeo?

🏃‍♂️

PrestonHammer

2 be or not 2 be, that is the question.