For all the progress West Ham United have made in the last month or so in the transfer market, the Premier League outfit still feel one top-class centre-forward short.
Kyle Walker-Peters and El Hadji Malick Diouf have substantially boosted the full-back ranks. The West Ham-bound John Victor said goodbye to Botafogo on Wednesday, while personal terms have been agreed with Leicester’s Mads Hermansen too.
This, coupled with the impressive form displayed by Niclas Fullkrug, Freddie Potts, Luis Guilherme and co over in the USA, plus Lucas Paqueta’s acquittal from spot-fixing charges, means the mood at West Ham United feels a lot lighter now than it was four weeks ago.
Bring in a quality striker to compete with Fullkrug, meanwhile, and the Hammers faithful might actually approach the new season with a sense of genuine optimism.Though if there is one centre-forward West Ham could roll back the clock for, one who slipped agonisingly through their fingers and has since blossomed into one of Europe’s elite number nines, it is the Ballon D’Or-nominated Serhou Guirassy.
Serhou Guirassy celebrates during Borussia Dortmund v CF Monterrey: Round Of 16 - FIFA Club World Cup 2025
Photo by Jonathan Moscrop/Getty Images
West Ham United wanted Borussia Dortmund’s Ballon D’Or nominee Serhou Guirassy
It is no secret that West Ham, when it comes to signing centre-forwards, have run into more obstacles than a seasoned Iron Man obsessive.
Gianluca Scamacca, Sebastien Haller, Lucas Perez, Albian Ajeti, to name but four who found goals far easier to come by either side of their ill-fated stay at West Ham.
We will never know if Serhou Guirassy would have fallen under the same curse which rendered Scamacca injury-prone, Haller ineffective, and Ajeti goalless in 12 Hammers appearances.
What we do know, however, is that West Ham were well ahead of the curve regarding a late-blooming number nine who – when first one their radar – had scored a respectable if unspectacular nine goals in 23 Ligue 1 appearances during the COVID-curtailed 2019/20 Ligue 1 season.
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“He had had a firm offer from West Ham in January, and asked to stay [instead],” the president of Amiens, Bernard Joannin, said five years ago.
“I would have no problem with him [if Guirassy was to leave in the coming summer]. We already have English offers and things will be done.”
Despite West Ham’s obvious admiration for the leggy, 6ft 2ins Frenchman, Guirassy would stay on the other side of the Channel. Rennes paid Amiens a cool £13 million a few months after Guirassy rebuffed the Hammers’ advances.
Half a decade later, West Ham’s loss is Borussia Dortmund’s gain.
West Ham eye Idrissa Gueye as Guirassy earns ‘world-class’ status
To think, the cynics felt that Guirassy had been something of a flash-in-the-pan when scoring a career-best 30 goals for Stuttgart in 2023/24. Surely he could not improve on such a tally, even when surrounded by the talents of Karim Adeyemi, Pascal Gross and co at Dortmund.
A remarkable return of 38 goals in black and yellow, though, was some way to respond to those now red-faced doubters.
The man who replaced Niclas Fullkrug as Dortmund’s number nine – ironically enough – now joins Ousmane Dembele, Robert Lewandowski, Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, Kylian Mbappe and co on a 30-strong Ballon D’Or shortlist revealed on Thursday by UEFA.
“Serhou is world class,” Dortmund boss Niko Kovac declared after Guirassy scored four goals in 43 minutes during February’s 6-0 obliteration of Union Berlin.
With 68 goals across the last two seasons, few could disagree with Kovac’s assessment.
The challenge facing West Ham United now meanwhile – five years after Guirassy turned down a transfer which might well have dispelled that striker curse for good – is to find a centre-forward capable of ascending to the same ‘world class’ heights.
Who knows? Perhaps another rising star of French football in Idrissa Gueye – West Ham are reportedly in talks with the Metz wonderkid – could prove to be Serhou Guirassy 2.0?