Transfer guru Fabrizio Romano has revealed that West Ham’s summer arrival Lucas Paqueta ‘was an option’ for the Premier League champions this summer.
The Italian journalist has claimed that Manchester City were interested in the Brazilian midfielder who ultimately ended up at the London Stadium in a club-record £51m deal from Lyon.
After 11 goals and seven assists in all competitions last season, the 25-year-old appeared to be on the radar of a number of clubs this summer, many of whom are in England with Arsenal and Newcastle heavily linked with a move for the creative midfielder, while Tottenham were also credited with an interest.
Now it has come to light that with the future of one of their current stars up in the air, City were also tracking the 33-cap Brazil ace
Writing in his daily briefing for Caught Offside Romano said: ‘Lucas Paqueta was an option for Manchester City this summer in case Bernardo Silva left the club. Bernardo stayed, and so Paqueta ended up joining West Ham.’
Replacing a player the calibre of Bernardo Silva is no easy task and perhaps speaks volumes for how talented a player the Hammers have actually acquired.
In his first start for the club against Chelsea, Paqueta posted a 7.2 SofaScore match rating with only Declan Rice (7.5) recording a higher score among his teammates.
He also ranked second in the side for accurate passes among players that started and first for duels won with seven.
Considering he ranks among the top 1% of players in his position for tackles per game (Fbref), tenacity off the ball as well as guile on it could be something we see more often than not from the Samba star and Paqueta could prove to be a very exciting addition as the season continues.
