West Ham United wanted Tyrell Malacia and David Moyes held direct talks to try and convince him into making the move.
It was pretty clear that West Ham wanted a new left back this summer.
Aaron Cresswell has been a great servant to West Ham but turns 33 later this year.
Arthur Masuaku was never really that comfortable as a left back in a four-man defence and West Ham allowed him to join Besiktas this summer.
Moyes wanted a left back and got one in Emerson Palmieri – but only after missing out on a deal for Manchester United ace Tyrell Malacia.
West Ham United wanted Tyrell Malacia
Back in June, Fabrizio Romano reported that West Ham made a late move to try and sign Malacia from Feyenoord.
It was quite the saga for Malacia.
It looked like Malacia was heading to Lyon – who had just lost Emerson at the end of his loan deal from Chelsea, ironically – with Dutch manager Peter Bosz keen.
Manchester United then hijacked the deal and brought Malacia to work with a different Dutch boss in Erik ten Hag.
Romano has now added more, stating on The Here We Go podcast that West Ham held direct talks to try and convince Malacia to join then.
That was when a move to Lyon was on the verge of being done, but Malacia rejected WesT ham in favour of Lyon.
Yet when Manchester United called just a day later, Malacia turned down Lyon and made the move to Old Trafford instead.
“All the fans know that it was done with Olympique Lyonnais, it was a Friday and it was done for the player to travel on the Monday,” said Romano. “Then Manchester United jumped into it on the Sunday night, and so on Monday they changed the story and signed Tyrell Malacia, who is doing great now with Erik ten Hag, Ten Hag was really happy with his potential signing.”
“But I can reveal that on the Saturday, West Ham – they were looking for a left back before signing Emerson Palmieri – had direct contact with Malacia. It was a direct contact also between David Moyes and the player’s side, but the player had his decision made on Lyon, so he said no to West Ham. Then on Sunday night, Manchester United appeared and signed Malacia,” he added.
Malacia, 23, has become a firm fan favourite in his opening weeks at United.
Rio Ferdinand has compared Malacia to Patrice Evra and believes that he effectively shut Mohamed Salah down in the 2-1 win over Liverpool last month.
Malacia appears to be a huge talent and West Ham will be gutted to have missed out, but will now hope to see encouraging signs from Emerson in the coming weeks and months.
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