West Ham have agreed terms to send promising defender Vashon Neufville on loan to Newport County for the rest of the season.
The League Two side, who sit 12th in England’s fourth division, confirmed the 19-year-old’s capture via their official Twitter account, revealing he would be at the club until the end of the campaign and that he would be available for the FA Cup tie against Leicester City.
PLAYER NEWS | Nineteen-year-old left-back Vashon Neufville has signed a loan deal with @NewportCounty until the end of the season from @WestHamUtd
The defender is available for selection in Sunday’s Emirates FA Cup tie with @LCFC#NCAFC
Read more ?https://t.co/1gruGBVnYD
— Newport County AFC (@NewportCounty) January 4, 2019
Neufville, a left back, has not yet appeared for the first team at the London Stadium but has one unused substitute outing, coming in the FA Cup tie against Shrewbury Town this time last year.
Opinion
Neufville has not been as close to the first team as some of his young counterparts, such as Declan Rice and Grady Diangana, this season and so shipping him out on a loan deal makes perfect sense. He needs to be playing on a regular basis and he should definitely find game time easy to come by in the fourth tier of English football. With West Ham manager Manuel Pellegrini having been given a headache by his current left back options in the senior side, thanks to the fluctuating form of Aaron Cresswell and Arthur Masuaku, Neufville might have thought he was in with a chance of a surprise first team outing between now and the end of the season. This goes to show how far off he is from the senior side in comparison to a number of his under-21 compatriots and he has plenty of work to do before he is considered among Pellegrini’s options at the back.