Much has been made of West Ham’s struggles in front of goal this season. Although they have improved in this regard in recent weeks, it’s still so obvious that they lack a goal-getter, an out and out striker who can help to drive them up the league.
The Hammers will have to address this issue in the summer if they want to compete for European qualification next term. Their most likely rivals for those spots are Everton and Southampton. Everton have Romelu Lukaku, and although it’s looking like he may leave the club, the Toffee’s will be doing everything they can to ensure the Belgian is playing at Goodison Park come next season.
Southampton have just signed Manolo Gabbiadini, before his last outing against Spurs, which ended in a first half injury, the Italian had netted 5 goals in 3 games since his arrival from Napoli.
A combination of injuries and signing players that were simply not up to it has cost West Ham dearly this year. The Hammers need to make sure their next signing up top isn’t another Simeone Zaza, who could barely control a ball never mind put it in the net.
But what options do they have? We’ve studied Europe’s biggest leagues to see who is performing this year, and who could make an impact at West Ham next season. Some of the transfers may prove difficult to pull off amid interest from other clubs, but that’s always going to be the case with strikers who can put the ball in the net – they’re in demand.
Firstly, the top goal scorer in Italy Andrea Belotti should be high on West Ham’s striker targets list in the summer. The Italian has netted 22 goals in 26 Serie A starts, all the more impressive when you consider that he is just 23 years of age. He’s deadly with both feet and in the air, a real gem of a player. It’s likely West Ham would have to pay upwards of £30million following such an impressive campaign, but he’ll be worth every penny should he carry his form over to the Premier League.
Another player West Ham should be keeping a close eye on his Kevin Gameiro, the Frenchman has scored 10 goals for Atletico Madrid this term and always looks so deadly when coming off the bench. After a stunning season last year at Sevilla he has struggled to nail down a permanent starting place at Atletico, which could open the door for West Ham should he wish to be the star man elsewhere.
A slightly left-field shout, who West Ham will have a far greater chance of signing is Steve Mounie from Montpellier. The 22-year-old has bagged 13 goals in 27 starts this term and ranks among the top goal scorers in Ligue 1. At 6ft 2in he’s a strong target man who’s still mobile enough to get around the pitch. Having scored 30% of his teams goals this year he knows what it’s like to be the main goal-getter in a team across a whole season, something Andy Carroll hasn’t done in what seems like forever due to his unfortunate injury record.
It remains to be seen which player the Hammers will pursue but it seems like the club must secure another striker if they want to improve their goals scored unless they rely upon the current options of Andre Ayew, Andy Carroll, Diafra Sakho, Jonathan Calleri and Ashley Fletcher to provide the goals required but that’s if they can all remain healthy over the course of the season. History however suggests West Ham will sign a striker this summer as since David Gold and David Sullivan took over the club in 2010 they have signed an incredible 32 strikers as the Guardian reported. West Ham had to wait until the 27th of November this season before a striker bulged the net when Andy Carroll scored with his stunning scissor-kick against Crystal Palace so it would seem that based upon that, the 12 goals scored in total by their strikers so far this season and the fact that midfielder/wing-back Michail Antonio is the side’s leading scorer then it would appear a new striker is definitely needed.