West Ham have confirmed Julen Lopetegui will succeed David Moyes as their head coach. The Spaniard has signed a two-year deal with an option for a third.
Moyes has left at the end of his contract after four and a half mostly successful years and Lopetegui is clear to take over having been out of work since he quit Wolves last August.
The former Spain and Real Madrid manager won the Europa League at Sevilla in 2020 and guided Wolves away from relegation trouble after taking in November of last season, finishing 13th. He left Wolves because of concerns over their lack of transfer activity.
Lopetegui will be handed funds to improve West Ham’s squad and his first pieces of business could be signing two players from Brazil. The club are in talks over a deal to sign the 28-year-old Brazil centre-back Fabricio Bruno from Flamengo and the 19-year-old winger Wesley Gassova from Corinthians.
The size of West Ham’s budget could depend on whether Lucas Paquetá, whose contract contains an £85m release clause, is targeted again by Manchester City. Paquetá leaving would depend on the Football Association ending an investigation into alleged betting breaches by the midfielder, who denies wrongdoing. West Ham are determined to keep the Ghana attacker Mohammed Kudus.
“We had other opportunities but I am very happy that West Ham chose me because I chose West Ham too, so we are really happy about this,” Lopetegui said. “We came here with the idea and the thought to make a big, big noise.”
The 57-year-old, who will officially start on July 1st, said of setting his sights high: “I feel that we have a fantastic platform. I think the last few years have been very good years to have this base, of course, but my ambition as a coach is always to be better and better, to achieve more and bigger aims and to encourage and improve the players, the team, and to compete because football is about this – to compete. We are very ambitious about this.”
West Ham said Lopetegui was bringing with him five backroom staff. - Guardian
