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West Ham close in on Pellegrini

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David Sullivan is expected to finalise the appointment of Manuel Pellegrini as the new West Ham manager tomorrow (Monday), according to a club insider.

Twitter account ExWHUemployee, which is established as an excellent source of Hammers information, claimed today that the former Manchester City boss, who left Chinese Super League side Hebei China Fortune this week, is jetting to London to agree terms.

It is said that the deal which has been tabled for the 64-year-old is “expected” to be agreed for him to take over from David Moyes, who left the club last week.

OPINION

There have been mixed verdicts from West Ham fans in response to the imminent appointment of Pellegrini. He has an impressive track record in multiple leagues, including La Liga and the Premier League, where he won the title at Man City as well as two League Cups. The 64-year-old is an experienced operator who embraces attacking football, something that cannot be said of the cautious Moyes or one of his recent predecessors, Sam Allardyce. But Pellegrini will be expensive to hire – at Hebei China Fortune, the Times report he earns the equivalent of £192,000-a-week – and his lack of charisma and personality makes it difficult to ‘sell’ his football vision to supporters. Many claim his success at City was more down to the brilliant squad at his disposal than his coaching brilliance. Nevertheless, Pellegrini is an upgrade on Moyes and Slaven Bilic, too, and it is to his advantage that he knows the English game well and has good command of the language. The players should instantly respect him. He is also used to working for clubs where he does not have the final say over transfers, which means he should be relatively low maintenance. 

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