When asked who my five dream signings would be, a whole host of memories of weeks spent in front of my laptop scouring the Football Manager database for that ‘next star’ come flooding back. Cheekily putting £5million bids in for players worth £15million just in case they are in financial woe and that those payments over 64 months will do the trick. Alas it never works.
Ironically two on my list are current West Ham players, on loan from Arsenal and Barcelona respectively, boring I know but I genuinely believe those two have made a massive difference this season.
As I walked back in the cold to Plaistow station on Sunday I said to my Dad, that if we managed to secure Alex Song in the summer it would be the best signing in our history. A big statement maybe, but from my seat at the weekend you could just tell he is too good for us, he always seems to find that pocket of space and with such ease too.
Now I have been told to try and be realistic, because naturally I would just reel off Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, Eden Hazard, Thiago Silva and that rather decent Belgian in-between the sticks at Stamford Bridge, Thibaut Courtois. But I don’t think anyone in world football has a budget that big let alone David Gold and Sullivan.
Those players will just have to wait until we are regulars in the Champions League, so two or three years time then. Messi and co can wait a few years, for now I will tell you my five ideal ‘realistic dream’ signings.
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This is silly…”until we are regulars in the Champions League, so two or three years time then”…..This is smug; you are letting this very enjoyable run go to your head. Regulars?? We have never been in the Champs league, let alone regulars! You sound like we have qualified already. Even if you say the comment is tongue in cheek, it belies an underlying feeling of sincerity about it.
Whilst it does feel a bit different this time (and hopefully the owners will not sell off our best players like in yesteryear), beware the old saying ‘WestHam go down with the Xmas lights’… Let’s just keep our feet on the ground… And remember, getting into the Champs league / Europe brings massive problems; look what happened to Newcastle; they got relegated the next season! Look how Liverpool have struggled. I don’t want West Ham to qaulify for Europe until we have a far deeper squad than the already good one we have…”regulars in the Champions League”???? Ha! Maybe one day, but not till we have proved ourselves to be regular 5-7th in Prem with a full Olympic Stadium…But under Sullivan, Gold and Allardyce things do seem to be belying our noose of “Fortune’s always hiding”….Credit to them and hopefully we can rub shoulders with the best one day, but not for a while yet
1] Alex Song
2] Carl Jenkinson
3] Mark Davies [ Bolton ]
4] Carlos Zambrano [ Centre Half – Eintracht Frankfurt ]
5] Eder Alvarez Balanta – [ Centre Half – River Plate ]
Along with the signings of Alex Song and Carl Jenkinson , I think the two centre halves of Balanta and Zambrano along with the guile of Bolton’s Mark Davies would really push us on in the 2015/2016 season , our last at the Boleyn .
If Davies is still struggling with his knee injury then Yoann Gourcuff from Olympique Lyonnais would do .
Along with Song and Jenkinson I think the signings of two strong centre halves in Zambrano and Balanta along with the guile of Mark Davies would push us on for our final season at the Boleyn .