West Ham boss David Moyes has admitted scouting a £70m duo now at Newcastle and Chelsea but chose new hero Nayef Aguerd instead.
West Ham fans who follow the transfer window closely will remember the club being heavily linked with Sven Botman and Benoit Badiashile – now at Newcastle and Chelsea respectively.
The Evening Standard claimed £35m Newcastle star Botman was a prime transfer target for Moyes when he was at Lille.
The Hammers were also heavily with £35m Chelsea signing Badiashile, who admitted there was contact before he eventually move to Stamford Bridge from Monaco.
Ligue 1 is one of West Ham’s key markets under head of recruitment Rob Newman.
Magpies chief Amanda Staveley told The Athletic at the time that Botman had chosen Newcastle over West Ham.
And Moyes admits scouting £70m duo now at Newcastle and Chelsea but chose new hero Nayef Aguerd instead.
Aguerd put in another superb performance in West Ham’s draw at Newcastle and produced one of the tackles of the season to deny Callum Wilson a winner.
West Ham boss David Moyes admits scouting £70m duo now at Newcastle and Chelsea but chose new hero Nayef Aguerd instead
Botman was also excellent, as he has been all season, while Badiashile is impressing at Chelsea.
Now Moyes has said he scouted Botman and Badiashile in his search for a new left-footed centre-back.
But he is happy to have chosen Aguerd instead.
“I’ve got to say I compare him (Aguerd) a lot to (Sven) Botman,” Moyes told the press (Football.London).
“Botman and Aguerd I thought were probably the two best left-footed centre-backs in France.
“Obviously there’s the boy who has gone to Chelsea (Badiashile) and there’s a few others but they were in a similar category. And we lost our centre-half for six months at the start of the season when he got an injury at Ibrox in a pre-season friendly.
“So he’s only played four or five Premier League games and it’s been a huge miss and you can see what he has done to us… and if you look at our results since he has come into the team it has been a big, big difference to us.”
West Ham fans have been so impressed with Aguerd many are already touting him to take over the captaincy from Declan Rice if he leaves the club – as expected – this summer.
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