David Moyes wants more signings at West Ham
(Picture: Getty Images)David Moyes says West Ham still “need to do an awful lot more business” before the transfer window closes and believes the club face “a bigger job than a lot of people think” to match the highs of recent seasons.
Burnley winger Maxwel Cornet is set to become the Hammers’ fifth signing of the summer in a £17.5million deal but of the previous four, Alphonse Areola was already at the club last summer on loan, while centre-back Nayef Aguerd will miss the first ten weeks of the season through injury.
Midfielder Flynn Downes, signed from Swansea, has been earmarked as one for the future, while the marquee addition, Italy striker Gianluca Scamacca, will not be fit to start Sunday’s opener against Manchester City.
“We need to do an awful lot more business,” Moyes said. “We lost four players - three outfield players and a goalkeeper - at the end of the season. We were already a couple of players short and we didn’t bring any players in in January.
"So, we have to fill these voids and hopefully we can do so. But we want to bring in quality players, we don’t want to just fill them for the sake of filling them. We want to bring in the best players we can. We’ve got lots of areas we’d like to address.”
At the end of last season, the Hammers lost Mark Noble to retirement as well as Andriy Yarmolenko, Ryan Fredericks and David Martin at the end of their contracts, while Arthur Masuaku has since been allowed to join Besiktas.
Moyes’ side reached the semi-finals of the Europa League last term and finished seventh in the Premier League to secure an immediate European return in the Conference League this season, but the Scot warned additions are needed if the club are to kick on again.
“The loss of one or two players means we’re going to have to find new players and the start of a sort of rebuild of a team,” he added. “We’re in the process of that just now. I love being back, but as I said, there’s quite a big job going on here at the moment.
“We’ve got a bigger job than a lot of people think to get a side as competitive, competing as well as we have in the last couple of seasons.”
