While Declan Rice remains the greatest export in West Ham United’s history, there will soon be two new faces either side of the former captain on the podium; Mateus Fernandes and Crysencio Summerville.
If you will allow your correspondent a brief moment to shake his fist at the whims of the universe, would you believe that only today we published a piece saying that the Hammers had no chance of getting £70 million for their Dutch international?
So of course it would emerge, only a few hours later, that Al-Hilal have reached an agreement with West Ham United regarding a mega-money deal for Crysencio Summerville.
£70m for Summerville! Where does this rank among West Ham’s best-ever sales?
Give us your immediate reaction!
The fee? Well, if we were to be ultra-picky, we’d say it’s £68 million. But, OK, yeah, go on and laugh, it’s £70 million for all intents and purposes [Sky Sports].
In our defence, there was little reason to believe that such an offer was about to arrive from Saudi Arabia. Roma were expected to win the race, having made a series of offers just below the £50 million release clause in his contract.
But a £70 million sale, coupled with the £85 million brought in for Mateus Fernandes, means West Ham are set to earn a combined £155 million in the space of one month via the sale of two players.
West Ham United record over £150m in sales as Crysencio Summerville heads to Al Hilal
Quite remarkably, this means that the summer of 2026 is about to become the most lucrative in the club’s entire history.
West Ham enjoyed an initial windfall of around £130 million back in 2023, when selling Declan Rice to Arsenal for a three-figure sum. The rest of that was accumulated via the departures of Gianluca Scamacca to Atalanta, Nikola Vlasic to Torino and Arthur Masuaku to Besiktas.
Said Benrahma and Thilo Kehrer would leave on loan, while Pablo Fornals joined Real Betis in January of that season.
By selling Fernandes and Summerville for a combined £155 million, however, West Ham are about to go beyond the summer of 2023 with five weeks remaining and despite having only sold two first-team players.
If you were Nils Koppen, who are YOU signing to replace Summerville?
Abdul Fatawu, Simon Adingra and Sorba Thomas have been linked…
When you consider that West Ham are a Championship club these days – rather than the Conference League winners of three years back – such a statistic looks all the more eye-catching.
It certainly speaks to the madness of the market. Rice was a seasoned Premier League skipper, a European trophy winner, and an established England international in 2023.
Fernandes, in contrast, suffered relegation in both of his top-flight campaigns while Summerville managed only six goals and five assists in 50 West Ham Premier League appearances.
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