Graeme Bailey has revealed on the Talking Transfers podcast that West Ham United retain an interest in winger Raphinha.
Despite not making any moves in the January transfer window, West Ham did attempt a double swoop for Leeds United duo Kalvin Phillips and Raphinha, although both of those bids were knocked back by the Whites. However, their interest in the latter doesn’t appear to have faded.
The Hammers are reportedly still contemplating a move for the Brazilian winger this summer. His well-documented potential move to Barcelona continues to drag on, and could now be in doubt, with Angel Di Maria tipped to join the Catalan giants.
According to Bailey, this will be music to the ears of people at West Ham, who are still interested in Raphinha.
He said: “It is interesting they are looking at Raphinha. They looked at him in January, they are keeping an eye on that situation.
Who would you rather have at West Ham?
Bowen!
Raphinha!
“West Ham tried to sign him in January. They made a bid for him – some people will debate how serious they were, but they did make a bid, the same as Kalvin Phillips.”
TIF Thoughts on West Ham’s interest in Raphinha…
Interestingly, Noel Whelan even called Raphinha ‘world-class’ and stated that he ‘makes the whole stadium sit up’.
While Jarrod Bowen hitting some exceptional heights this season with West Ham helped them massively in both the league and Europa League, that has seen interest in him grow, with the likes of Liverpool said to admire the winger, so bringing in Raphinha could help soften any potential departure.
Raphinha has been in the league for just two years but already has a reported £60m price tag on his head, which is no surprise given his impressive attacking output of 17 goals and 12 assists across 67 games for the Whites, so he certainly won’t come cheap if the Hammers are serious about signing the winger.