What West Ham United would give for a centre-forward you would bet your house on in a one-v-one situation. Lyon are certainly not lacking in that department, with Real Madrid loanee Endrick boosting his impressive numbers by the week.
Hammers News reported back in October that West Ham were watching Endrick’s situation closely at the Santiago Bernabeu.
The Brazilian wonderkid had appeared on their radar before, back in January 2025. And, with a first-team spot at Real Madrid proving difficult to keep hold of 12 months down the line, a team who had appointed Nuno Espirito Santo a couple of weeks earlier were keen to position themselves once again as a mid-season solution.
If we are to get a RESULT vs Arsenal, how do you think we’d do it? 🧐
By the time January arrived, though, Endrick had given his word to Lyon.
West Ham United had talks with Real Madrid over Endrick
Talks were indeed held with Real Madrid and West Ham United. The structure of a deal would prove difficult, however.
Lyon eventually paid a loan fee of around £1 million, while agreeing to contribute 50 per cent of the striker’s £100,000-a-week wages. But if that felt like a lot of money for a 19-year-old loanee, Lyon are seeing sizeable returns on their admittedly short-term investment.
On a weekend in which Pablo Felipe came under fire following arguably his least-effective performance yet in a Hammers jersey, as Taty Castellanos struck the woodwork twice, Endrick blasted Stade Rennais away.
The third goal in a 4-2 Lyon victory was a finish so emphatic, so confident, that it was almost impossible to imagine any current member of the West Ham squad pulling it off, with the possible exception of Jarrod Bowen or a fully-fit Crysencio Summerville.
If not Pablo – who plays up front? 🤔
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Endrick made a superb start to Ligue 1 life with Lyon
In total, Endrick has racked up eight goals and seven assists in an OL shirt. 15 goal contributions in 19 matches. Comfortably more than Pablo [one] and Castellanos [five] have managed between them.
“It’s unclear whether he has the makings of a star, but he’s already a different kind of player,” L’Equipe wrote shortly after the former Palmeiras sensation rattled in a hat-trick on his second Ligue 1 appearance.
“He provides the dynamism that OL so sorely lacked in the first half of the season. He has [created] danger to an astonishing degree from his very first appearance [at Lyon].”
Endrick has five Ligue 1 goals from XG of just over four, and six assists from an XG of around two. This speaks to the sheer quality of his end product; a Man of the Match performance in which he scored one and set up the other in a 2-1 win at Paris Saint-Germain the obvious highlight.
While Pablo wasted a rare chance to get off the mark for West Ham early on in Saturday’s 3-0 defeat at Brentford – a tame effort comfortably pushed aside by Coaimhin Kelleher – the way Endrick almost blasted the Rennes net off its hinges created a contrast the Hammers could have done without in a season already full of regrets.
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