There is a new name joining the likes of Liam Delap, Emanuel Emegha and Yuri Alberto on West Ham United’s striker hitlist with the Premier League outfit eyeing a £25 million Europa League winner.
A £25 million Europa League who appears in dire need of a fresh start, and a season not ruined by injury issues.
West Ham will have the chance to watch Liam Delap up close when Graham Potter’s team bring an end to their Premier League campaign away at Ipswich Town on Sunday.
The Hammers like Strasbourg star Emanuel Emegha – one of the breakout talents of French football – while Yuri Alberto still has London Stadium admirers two years after Corinthians turned down their £15 million bid.
Yuri Alberto is, however, not the only long-time target still under consideration.
Football correspondent Graeme Bailey, speaking exclusively to Hammers News, reveals that West Ham United could make a fresh approach towards El Bilal Toure after missing out on the Almeria-owned striker back in 2023.
Photo by John Powell/Liverpool FC via Getty Images
Photo by John Powell/Liverpool FC via Getty Images
Atalanta striker El Bilal Toure still on West Ham United’s radar
West Ham were heavily linked with El Bilal Toure on the back of a spell in Spain with UD Almeria.
He scored a respectable seven goals to keep his team safe from relegation during the 2022/23 season. Almeria would surely have dropped out of the division if it was not for Toure’s famous winner against Barcelona, or his strike in a 1-1 draw with Atletico Madrid.
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Almeria invested a cool £25 million in a then-21-year-old centre-forward that following summer, fighting off competition from the likes of West Ham and Everton.
A serious hamstring injury meant Toure would have to wait until January to make his debut for the Serie A overachievers, however. And by that point he had fallen well down the pecking order.
The now-23-year-old Toure then made a loan move to Stuttgart, only for a metatarsal fracture kept him out for another three months on German soil. The luckless Toure has played less than 40 minutes of Bundesliga football since November, scoring only three times in 17 Stuttgart appearances.
Stuttgart will have an obligation to buy the Mali international permanently for £14 million if certain conditions are met. Though his lack of availability over in Germany suggests that Atalanta may instead find themselves back at square one should they look to get Toure off the books full-time.
El Bilal Toure has ‘exceptional speed’ and likened to Liverpool’s Darwin Nunez
It remains to be seen, meanwhile, whether West Ham would be willing to risk a permanent, up-front deal for a striker who has been limited to only six league starts in two seasons in Serie A and the Bundesliga.
The most sensible approach may be to negotiate another loan, in order to gauge Toure’s fitness before consigning themselves to a sizeable investment.
“He has demonstrated his qualities in France, Spain, and most recently in Italy with Atalanta,” Fabian Wohlgemuth, Stuttgart’s director for sport, said when Toure first arrived in Germany.
“He’s the type of player we haven’t had before, and his exceptional speed will add another important facet to our attack.”
Given that this is a West Ham side light on pace in key areas – a 32-year-old Niclas Fullkrug is hardly the quickest off the mark – Toure’s explosive acceleration would bring a different sort of dimension to Graham Potter’s inconsistent frontline.
And, despite not featuring anywhere near as much as he would have liked, Toure can still point to a record of 11 goals in his last 22 starts in the respective top-flights of Spain, Italy and Germany.
Photo by Silvestre Szpylma/Quality Sport Images/Getty Images
Photo by Silvestre Szpylma/Quality Sport Images/Getty Images
His stoppage time winner away to Juventus in the Champions League this season, meanwhile, saw Toure described as ‘world-class’ by fellow Stuttgart forward Denis Undav.
Interestingly, the official Bundesliga website likened El Bilal Toure’s crash-and-bang approach to that of divisive Liverpool frontman Darwin Nunez. Always unpredictable, but occasionally show-stopping.
“Both are strong, powerful players with explosive pace and are not shy of a goal in a big game,” they write, Toure backing up that latter point as he barged through the Juventus backline in Turin.
“One thing is certain; If Touré can live up to his potential, he’ll be a nightmare for defenders.