If there is one area of the pitch that West Ham might need to think about going forward, it’s in goal.
While Lukasz Fabianski is currently the trusted man between the sticks, his contract is up at the end of the season and neither Darren Randolph nor David Martin are the future in the position.
That’s why we’ve seen a few rumours linking them to a new goalkeeper, with AS Roma’s Pau López the most recent.
As you might recall, the Spaniard has already had a brief taste of English football during a loan spell with Tottenham, before a move to Real Betis, which eventually earned him a £21m transfer to Italy a year later.
While the start there was promising, things went downhill from January 2020 onwards, and the 26-year-old has taken time to recover.
According to Gazzetta dello Sport on Wednesday, his value has nearly halved in that time, with Roma likely to ‘struggle to make €12-15m’, making him an approachable target for various clubs.
However, a return to the first-team over the past six games or so has rekindled a desire to play in Rome, which is why Tuesday’s report suggested he wanted to finish the season in Italy.
That being said, there was a period when he was being offered around, and Gazzetta mention West Ham, Tottenham, Valencia and Bayer Leverkusen as interested sides.
None of those were ‘concrete enough’, though, with a few loan offers being ‘immediately rejected’.
It seems the Hammers had their window, but López’s recent return to the team has now scuppered any January plans, at least until the end of the campaign.
Then, we’ll see.
