West Ham United aren’t having the season they’d have hoped for having dispensed with David Moyes’ services at the end of the last campaign.
The hope was to see the club advance under Julen Lopetegui, but the Spaniard has so far struggled to get the best out of his squad. That’s seen questions emerge around his future, although those have calmed down somewhat over the past week.
The Hammers brought in multiple players during the summer and so far most have failed to hit the heights expected. Niclas Füllkrug is very much in that category after the German striker arrived on a permanent transfer from Borussia Dortmund.
Struggling with injuries since his arrival at West Ham, the 31-year-old has played less than 200 minutes so far and is still trying to get to his best level.
Bild have covered an interview he’s given to a German podcast and they headline with a general comment from the player about his move to England: ‘Füllkrug: “Absolutely awful”‘
The German newspaper goes on to quote him as saying: “Of course, I also had very intensive discussions about such a risky step. Because I knew that I was taking a step deeper and taking a certain risk that I wouldn’t play internationally (in Europe) next year, maybe not the year after that either, and that I would make a big, big change.
“I was aware of that, I communicated a lot with the coach, spoke a lot with Tim Steidten, who I know from my time at Bremen, which is how we got in touch so closely. Of course, we had completely different goals. Things were going really badly for me too, to put it bluntly.”
On his fitness, the former BVB player said: “I was injured for three months and didn’t even reach my top performance because I’ve only been training for a week and a half. It seemed like I was back at a good level relatively quickly because I came in and scored the goal.
“My Achilles tendon was inflamed and it was really annoying. I’ve had something like that before, it lasted six weeks, now it’s taken a bit longer and this phase is catastrophic. You just want to play and you feel like you’re close, but then there’s another setback.”
