In dire need of a new striker, West Ham United fired a few last minute bids on transfer deadline day to try and give David Moyes more firepower.
The Hammers tried their luck with Darwin Nuñez at Benfica, to no avail, and then went after Duván Zapata, currently at Atalanta.
The latter saw two bids arrive from West Ham for his services, which has been reported on before, one that was just a dry loan worth €2m up front, while the other was €32m for a permanent transfer.
These were said to have arrived ‘on the gong’, meaning right at the very end of deadline day, but with little time to find the adequate replacement and get their own deal over the line, the Serie A side refused.
Gazzetta dello Sport explain that while Atalanta have not fully confirmed the extent of the injury, it’s already known it’s ‘serious’ and ‘the stop will be long’.
Having just come back from a 50 day absence, this appears to be a relapse, and ‘it will be necessary to assume an absence at least as long: at least two, if not three, months’.
There is also a ‘worse hypothesis’, which is that those 2-3 months ‘may not be enough’, meaning more time on the sidelines, but that will only come to light after further investigations.
A bullet dodged for West Ham, perhaps, although whether he would have injured himself had he transferred to London Stadium is something we’ll now never know.
