OPINION
West Ham must act now to sign Liverpool defender Nathaniel Clyne as a host of teams are sure to make their moves with Jurgen Klopp reportedly now willing to let him go on loan.
Reliable Hammers insider EXWHUemployee shared via their Twitter account early in December that Hammers did have an interest in the Reds’ 27-year-old right-back ahead of the January window opening.
Yep there is interest there for a long an and we have looked at a couple of others from abroad https://t.co/lb5IWkvUsa
— ExWHUEmployee (@ExWHUEmployee) December 4, 2018
However the Hammers won’t be alone in wanting Clyne and given that he is a talented right-back with a tremendous amount of Premier League experience, Manuel Pellegrini must act now to ensure his options on the right-side of his defence are properly bolstered.
According to the Daily Mirror Fulham, Leicester City and Cardiff City are all thought to be in pursuit of the Reds player and those three will likely act soon seeing as Klopp has given the green light to the player having a temporary exit due to wanting him to get regular football.
Clyne, who earns £70,000-a-week at Anfield (Source: Spotrac), has only managed to make four appearance for the senior side this season due to falling down the pecking order while spending the majority of his 2017/18 campaign out injured.
The 27-year-old shone bright in his 2016/17 campaign at Anfield but a back injury cruelly kept him sidelined for a significant period of time, and while he was out Joe Gomez and Trent Alexander-Arnold seized their opportunity to show Klopp what they were capable of.
However it’s worth nothing that ahead of his long spell on the sidelines, Clyne was showing everyone how good he was as an attacking and defensive presence at right-back, so if he was able to get back to 100% he would be fantastic player for the Hammers to call upon.
Pablo Zabaleta clearly is fantastic right-back but Ryan Fredericks out injured and struggling to adept to the Premier League, the Hammers need someone like Clyne to call upon in the second half of the season.
Though to have any chance of getting him, they need to strike sooner rather than later.
