David Moyes has a really simple solution to West Ham United’s potential AFCON woes in the new year.
The Africa Cup of Nations begins in January and West Ham boss David Moyes faces the prospect of losing four players for the tournament for the best part of a month.
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Said Benrahma (Algeria), Mohammed Kudus (Ghana), Maxwel Cornet (Ivory Coast) and Nayef Aguerd (Morocco) could be representing their countries at AFCON this winter, if they all qualify and are selected for their respective squads of course.
The real concern there is that two of those players are natural left wingers whilst Kudus can play there as well.
Pablo Fornals is obviously an option but I believe the real solution for the Hammers is staring Moyes in the face…
David Moyes has a really simple solution to West Ham United’s potential AFCON woes
After having taken four points from our opening two Premier League games, West Ham faced Brighton away.
Moyes set up with a midfield three of Edson Alvarez, James Ward-Prowse and Tomas Soucek, with Lucas Paqueta out on the left wing.
This is surely the route Moyes will take in January, when West Ham trio Benrahma, Kudus and Cornet are all away at AFCON.
Sure, we won’t play pretty football as such with that particular setup, but we will definitely be hard to beat.
The other option for Moyes is of course to sign another left winger when the January transfer window opens. I’m just not sure that will happen though, considering how notoriously difficult it is to get good value for money in January.
At least a simple option is there for Moyes to use if and when the time calls for it, and the fact that he set up that way away at Brighton shows that that particular system and starting XI is probably the one the West Ham manager will opt for when we lose the players mentioned above to AFCON.
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