You can expect to hear the name ‘Eli Junior Kroupi’ quite a lot over the next 48 hours, and not just because he is travelling to London for West Ham United’s late Saturday night kick-off at home to AFC Bournemouth.
Across the last five matchdays, only Man United and Chelsea have picked up more points than West Ham United [10] and Andoni Iraola’s Cherries [11].
Something has to give this weekend, then.
And Eli Junior Kroupi – for whom the narrative almost writes itself – will surely pose the biggest test yet to Nuno Espirito Santo’s new-look Axel Disasi and Konstantinos Mavropanos centre-back partnership.
Could Eli Junior Kroupi be West Ham’s biggest ever ‘one that got away’?
The Hammers agreed a £35m fee for him…
West Ham had agreed to sign Kroupi in a £35 million deal from FC Lorient a year ago, according to Peter O’Rourke. Bournemouth would then snatch the teenage forward from under Hammers’ noses; taking full advantage of their ‘multi-club model’, the connections between themselves and Les Merlus brought about by American businessman Bill Foley.
Just to rub salt into Hammers’ wounds, Kroupi has the third-best goals-per-minute ratio in Premier League history at present. Only Erling Haaland and Sergio Aguero can better his record of a goal every 110 minutes.
A record he will be determined to improve further against a West Ham side who may already be fearing that they narrowly missed out on the competition’s next striking superstar.
Andoni Iraola explains how Bournemouth landed ex-West Ham United target Eli Junior Kroupi
So whatever happens on Saturday night, Kroupi is guaranteed to be a topic of sustained discussion. His eight goals have come in just eleven starts, and from an XG of just over four.
Mads Hermansen has been a man revived between the sticks, but he will surely need to be at his most alert against a forward capable of hitting the corners from any range and from the vast majority of angles. His most recent strike was a glorious dipping volley from the edge of the box at Wolves.
Speaking at his pre-match press conference on Friday, head coach Andoni Iraola opens up on the series of events which led to Kroupi becoming a Bournemouth player. Lorient may have accepted West Ham’s offer, but the Cherries always had matters under control.
“I don’t really know how the negotiation went [with West Ham]. I think it was quite clear from our side, that is a player that the club obviously had very well controlled,” says Iraola. “They were following with the relations with Lorient, and I think there was little doubt from our side that we wanted Junior.”
Kroupi scored 23 goals while firing Lorient to promotion last season, all before his 19th birthday.
“I’m not telling Junior how you finish, how you put your feet so you can score. He’s amazing at doing this, you know,” Iraola adds, highlighting the extraordinary natural talent of one of European football’s breakout stars.
“I’m not going to show him anything in that department. I need to tell him what the team needs so he can be on the pitch, so he can score his goals, he can do his plays. And I think he’s improving a lot. He’s improving a lot because it’s kind of a new position for him is not so different.”
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Are you losing faith in him?
Kroupi vs Taty Castellanos as Hammers host the Cherries
While Nuno had fielded a throwback, two-striker combination of Taty Castellanos and Pablo Felipe until the latter’s injury – Pablo is ‘getting better’ but remains unavailable for Bournemouth – Iraola has often played Kroupi as a roving ‘second striker’ behind the hard-running Evanilson.
It will not only be down to Disasi and Mavropanos to stop him, then, but also the defensive midfielders. Soungoutou Magassa could come in for Freddie Potts, suspended following his red card at Burton.
“Basically, when we play with Eva and Junior, we are playing with two strikers, but there is some demands on the ball and off the ball that both need to do, and I think they are doing well,” Iraola explains.
“I’m happy with Junior, even if he starts or if he comes from the bench.”
Two in-form sides, two in-form frontlines.
Iraola is a big fan of Taty Castellanos, having come up against the former Girona striker in their La Liga days. Crysencio Summerville kept his ‘almost unstoppable’ form going against Burton Albion in the FA Cup, while Jarrod Bowen, Mateus Fernandes and Tomas Soucek are always good for a goal or two.
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