Kevin Nolan has admitted West Ham made a mistake by not signing Julian Alvarez when they had the chance to whilst he was still at River Plate.
West Ham have had a busy summer following the departure of David Moyes and have made a number of quality signings including the likes of Max Kilman, Crysencio Summerville, Luis Guilherme and Niclas Fullkrug.
The Hammers are looking to get back into European football having missed out completely last season and on the face of it are building a really strong squad for Julen Lopetegui, who is being heavily backed.
Nolan, who was a first team coach under Moyes and also had a spell at West Ham as a player left the club this summer along with the Scot.
Following his departure Nolan has opened up on his time at the London Stadium and when asked about the possibility of signing Alvarez in the summer of 2022, he admitted that was one of his regrets.
“To be fair, we did a lot of work on Alvarez the season he signed,” he told the No Tippy Tappy Football podcast.
“We did a lot of work leading up to it. And one of the first things I said he’s a Man City player right away.
“Like when obviously the boss said what you think, I just said he’s a Man City player for me because he just looked the part.
“I think for me he was probably a bit too slight, and what we needed was someone a bit bigger because he was on his own, but he adapted fantastically well. But he was given the opportunity to adapt because of how Man City are and what they do.”
Alvarez ended up joining City that summer for just £14m and went on to win the Treble in his first season and he’s agreed to join Atletico Madrid in a deal which could be worth up to £81m.
It’s an interesting case of what might have been if West Ham had taken the gamble on Alvarez and he’s now proven himself to be a top quality operator.
In this instance West Ham’s loss was very much Manchester City’s gain from both a playing and financial standpoint and it will be mistake the Hammers won’t want to repeat in the future.
The post Kevin Nolan blasts West Ham for making costly mistake in the transfer market appeared first on CaughtOffside.
