Opinion from the stands

Jordan Ayew? Jonjo Shelvey? West Ham should avoid these bottom three players, and here’s why…

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Football Soccer - Newcastle United v West Ham United - Barclays Premier League - St James' Park - 16/1/16Newcastle United's Jonjo Shelvey in action with West Ham's Mark Noble
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Shelvey battles with Noble earlier in the season

I was asked at the weekend if there are any players from the relegated clubs this season that I would take at West Ham in the summer. We decided to assume Aston Villa, Sunderland and Newcastle would be the teams that went down, as they currently lie in the relegation places and thought about the best from those clubs.

Jordan Ayew has been rumoured in the last few days, as a decent replacement for Diafra Sakho, who is currently AWOL amid whispers he could be on his way out.

Jonjo Shelvey was suggested, as was Georginio Wijnaldum. One of my friends was claimed that we would take Andros Townsend for around £7 million, half of what he cost Newcastle 3 months ago.

Some of these players have been decent Premier League players for several years. Wijnaldum has at times looked head and shoulders above the rest of the Newcastle squad, but in my mind I would say no to all of them. And here’s why…

We should be looking at Champions League players, not Premier League cast offs.

West Ham are pushing up the table, and with our move to the Olympic Stadium this summer, we will need a larger squad to be able to fight on all fronts next season in the Europa League. We will need some players, but other than maybe a couple of players that Bilic will be showing the door (hopefully Sakho sorts his attitude out and does stay) we won’t be having a complete squad overhaul.

We need maybe 3/4 top players to be contending again next season.

We should have a top four mentality when looking at signing players. These players haven’t done enough for their clubs this season, why should we decide that they are good enough for a top four club if they are barely performing at Aston Villa or Sunderland. A few years back we would have welcomed some of these players with open arms, but we know now that we can get better.

We don’t want to waste £10 million each on Shelvey and Ayew when we could get Lacazette for £20 million.

We need quality, not quantity. A few marquee additions to the squad will boost it massively for next season.

The fans don’t want overpriced English players like Andros Townsend when we already have Michail Antonio. Or Shelvey when we have Noble. It would just be filling out the squad in areas where we are already strong enough.

West Ham are past looking at relegation fodder, they haven’t done enough for their respective clubs so why should we be the team to give them another chance. We want players with a winning mentality, and if we have 50/60 million to spend this summer, it makes far more sense to spend it on 3 top additions to the starting line-up then waste it on 5/6 squad players that aren’t better than what we already have.

Jordan Ayew, Andros Townsend or Jonjo Shelvey?

No thanks.

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