West Ham have revealed to Claret & Hugh that the club has already begun negotiations for early summer transfer deals—but the update came with a warning.
Speaking to a top source at the London Stadium this morning, C&H asked whether negotiations were underway and if the recruitment team were successfully identifying targets ahead of the upcoming window.
Our enquiry followed reports that chairman David Sullivan had already opened talks for Burnley’s soon-to-be out-of-contract defender CJ Egan-Riley.
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While the club was understandably reluctant to discuss individual players, they did confirm that early-stage negotiations had begun. “Yes we have [started negotiating], we know who we want but it’s early stages,” a senior source told us.
However, as has been repeatedly made clear by multiple insiders, West Ham must sell before they can buy.
“We need to get players out because we can’t buy until we start trading,” the source added.
That said, any potential deal for Egan-Riley—whose contract expires this summer—should boil down to wages and a signing-on fee. With money saved from released players and returning loanees, such a move is likely to be financially manageable.
The Hammers would seem to be laying the groundwork for our summer rebuild which is going to define whether we face another season of struggle in the next campaign.