West Ham’s senior professional player exodus under Graham Potter is still reverberating around the club. ‘Lack of leaders on the pitch‘ has been a near-constant criticism levelled at a side which has undergone enormous change with virtually the whole squad turning over in the three seasons since the Conference League win.
Michail Antonio, Vladi Coufal, Aaron Cresswell the vice captain, former captain Kurt Zouma, Lucas Fabianski , Nayef Aguerd – even senior pro Danny Ings hundreds of caps between them, all medal winners from Prague and all jettisoned last year.
The impact on the dressing room has been enormous as a whole new side has struggled to gel under successive managers.
Only since the arrival of Nuno’s assistant Paco Jemez in January has the ‘team’ started playing like one.
As a senior pro, Lucas Fabianski was hastily welcomed back into the fold after his Potter-induced exit last summer. The 40 year old goalkeeper its currently listed as the Hammers’ third choice but has a contract expiring this summer. The club does appear to have an opportunity to snap him up, according to today’s NYTimes.com:
“[Fabianski] is yet to hold talks with the club over a contract extension but does appear open to remaining at the London Stadium in some capacity.
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Fabianski- keen to stay at West Ham and coach
“We’ll see what form the club takes, what the situation will be like (if I will stay for another season), but I’d definitely be very interested in working in the West Ham academy (as a goalkeeping coach),” the 40-year-old told Polish media outlet WP SportoweFakty.”
376 League and Premier League appearances means Fabianski has so much to offer West Ham’s next generation of talent: Hopefully the club recognise this and nail him down to a coaching position long term.
In such a period of change – whether top tier survival is secured or not – the steadying influence of having senior professionals around the club is just what has been missing since Moyes’ era and the Irons would do well to squeeze everything they can from ‘Super Fab’ in coming seasons: As, in fact, they could have, probably should have, and maybe one day soon will do – the same with senior pro Michail Antonio.