Luke Edwards has claimed on the Transfer Gossip Daily podcast that West Ham could be about to miss out on target Ainsley Maitland-Niles.
West Ham have been one of the busiest clubs in the transfer window this summer signing seven new players thus far and splashing out over £120 million and certainly don’t appear to be done just yet with a second bid for Lucas Paqueta having been lodged.
The Hammers saw their first bid knocked back by Lyon which stood at around £33 million, but he’s not the only player being tipped to join David Moyes’ side with Arsenal’s forgotten man Maitland-Niles linked.
However, Edwards believes that the England international could be destined for the south coast.
He said (8:10): “Maitland-Niles, what has he done with his career? When he looks back on it, I’m a little bit older than these players now and I have a little bit of life experience without wanting to sound patronising, but when he looks back on his career, he spent the early part of it at Arsenal not playing first team football, being sent out on loan to Ipswich, West Brom, AS Roma.
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“He needs to move, he needs to get away from Arsenal, he probably should have gone 12 months ago, if not 24 months ago, he’s got one year left on his contract and I think there’s still a really really good player there.
“There’s a lot of talent that has been to this point, I would say and I don’t think I’ve been too cruel by saying it’s been wasted, he’s got one year left on his contract, if he can get a loan move I think Southampton and Bournemouth are also interested I think it’s more likely to lend up at one of them.”
TIF Thoughts on Maitland-Niles…
While the name and pedigree of Maitland-Niles is not likely to get the pulses racing amongst West Ham fans unlike Gianluca Scamacca did and Lucas Paqueta is likely to do, but his versatility and youth could have been very valuable to Moyes.
The 24-year-old has just one year remaining on his contract and would obviously count towards any clubs’ homegrown quota they need to hit when registering their 25-man Premier League squad, so it appears to be a very smart deal.
Having spent the second half of last season on loan at Roma making just seven league starts, Maitland-Niles may need to force through a permanent move this summer instead of a temporary switch which would have him still thinking about an Arsenal future, as one clearly isn’t on the cards.