Whisper it but, as Konstantinos Mavropanos, Jean-Clair Todibo and Crysencio Summerville go from strength to strength, the Tim Steidten era at West Ham United may soon be due for a bit of a revisit.
Three of the German’s big-money additions shone as West Ham blew Sunderland away at the London Stadium on Saturday afternoon.
Who would have thought we would see the day when Konstantinos Mavropanos is being talked about as a reliable Premier League centre-half? Jean-Clair Todibo has been transformed under Nuno; from sluggish and shaky to a powerhouse at the back.
Crysencio Summerville channelled his inner-Alan Shearer, meanwhile, with an ‘amazing’ header to give his team the lead.
Summerville, Todibo and Mavropanos are firing at last!
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That is three in three now for the previously goal-shy winger whose unexpected emergence as a prolific goalscorer has come at the perfect moment, with Lucas Paqueta unavailable again.
Of course, as West Ham allow Guido Rodriguez to join Valencia on a free-transfer, it will take more than a few impressive displays from Mavropanos and Summerville for Tim Steidten’s reputation to be re-evaluated.
Steidten continues to defend Niclas Fullkrug, and the £27 million fee paid for a striker who scored only three times in eleven top-flight starts. The former technical director has a case to answer, as well, regarding the additions of Max Kilman, Carlos Soler, Edson Alvarez, Luis Guilherme and James Ward-Prowse.
Yet, if West Ham do pull off a repeat of 2007’s ‘Great Escape’, they will do so with thanks to a core of players who joined on the German’s watch. Mavropanos, Todibo and Summerville, yes, but also Aaron Wan-Bissaka.
Young Mohamadou Kante may prove to be a Steidten masterclass too, at just £500,000.
Tim Steidten wanted Werder Bremen’s Victor Boniface at West Ham United
Although if Steidten had brought Victor Boniface to East London, even a revitalised Summerville might not have been enough to rescue his reputation.
According to reporter Alan Nixon, on his Patreon page, Steidten was pushing West Ham to sign Boniface for a record £50 million in January 2024. Two years on, the Nigeria international has scored only 15 goals in 52 games since then.
An injury-hit loan spell at Werder Bremen from Bayer Leverkusen, two of Steidten’s former employers, suggests that the Hammers may have dodged a cannonball rather than a bullet. Suddenly, compared to Boniface for £50 million, Fullkrug for £27 million does not seem quite so egregious.
Speaking to Deich Stube, while defending his decision to bring Fullkrug to England, he also feels that Werder were justified in taking a punt on Boniface. The striker fired Bayer Leverkusen to Bundesliga glory with 21 goals as recently as 2023/24, after all.
On the other hand, the fact that Boniface missed 14 games through injury last season means the fitness problems currently keeping him out of Werder’s XI were hardly impossible to predict.
“When scouting or planning the squad, you should never commit to specific names,” Steidten begins. “At West Ham, for example, I established a policy where we no longer discuss individual names with the coach during squad planning, but only the profiles we’re looking for.
“This makes squad planning more objective, because otherwise there’s always the risk that each individual player is susceptible to subjective influence.
“However, I also find it difficult to view the Boniface transfer, in retrospect, as entirely negative. Without that specific situation [the injuries], Werder would never have acquired this player. The club’s management was frequently criticised for not being bold enough, but they made courageous decisions this summer with Samuel Mbangula [formerly of Juventus] and Boniface.
“Yet, they’re still being criticised.”
Boniface yet to score in the Bundesliga after leaving Bayer Leverkusen on loan
In the defence of those critics, Victor Boniface has not scored a Werder Bremen goal in his eleven appearances.
To think, Italian giants AC Milan were set to sign Boniface for big money before getting cold feet during his medical. West Ham are not the only ones, then, who will be breathing a sigh of relief.
“The general rule is, if you put all your eggs in one basket with a player who is injury-prone, it can become a problem,” Steidten admits. “However, if you bring in such a player as a complement [to your existing squad], I think it’s a good transfer.
“Whether I would have made this transfer myself in the summer, I can’t definitively say, as I don’t know the results of the medical tests. In the past, though, we’ve had transfers at Werder that our medical department advised against, and those players still played two full seasons for us!”
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Steidten defends Niclas Fullkrug signing at the London Stadium
Steidten, perhaps burned by the way his West Ham spell ended, insists that it will require a good ‘fit’ for him to return to club football.
The German saw Fullkrug open his Milan account during last week’s 1-0 victory over Lecce.
“We signed ‘Fulle’ because we saw him as exactly the kind of pivotal striker [West Ham] needed,” Steidten explains. “Someone who, in addition to his great sporting ability, was also a leader in the dressing room and possessed a great hunger for success.
“Unfortunately, he was unlucky enough to get injured very early in the season. In the Premier League, due to the enormous intensity, it’s difficult to return from injury, as you hardly get any time to ease back into it.
“On top of that, there was a lot of turmoil at the club. There were managerial changes, and I also left. When trusted figures are gone, it doesn’t make it any easier for a player to perform consistently.
“Therefore, it was a combination of several factors that unfortunately meant things didn’t work out for him and West Ham as everyone had hoped.”
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