West Ham: Moyes sold “phenomenal” star for £20m, now he’s better than Antonio
Attacking flair and free-flowing football are two phrases that haven’t been associated with West Ham United in seasons gone by, but David Moyes now has an abundance of quality to choose from in the final third.
Facilitated by the sale of Declan Rice to Arsenal, the Hammers were able to splurge their newly found riches on talents such as James Ward-Prowse, Edson Alvarez and Mohammed Kudus this summer, and the excitement of those signings off the field has translated into performances on it.
With 14 points accumulated, and 15 goals scored from their opening eight matches, West Ham have found a new lease of life in the final third and Ward-Prowse’s wand of a right foot has been at the heart of that, notching up five goal contributions so far.
While West Ham are creating and scoring chances at will, their fortunes in front of goal last season painted a completely different picture, only mustering 42 goals as Jarrod Bowen and Said Benrahma finished as the clubs joint-top scorers with six.
What’s more alarming is that Moyes let go of someone who has gone on to score 52 goals since departing the club for £20m in January 2021. That player is Sebastien Haller.
How did Sebastien Haller perform at West Ham?
During his 18-month stint at the London stadium, Haller only mustered 17 goal contributions in 54 appearances – an underwhelming return for someone who cost the club a whopping club record £45m in the summer of 2019.
Criticised by sections of the fanbase for being “lazy” while others slammed the lack of service provided to him, the Ivorian certainly didn’t live up to the price tag at West Ham, and he even admitted himself that the price tag weighed too heavy on his shoulders.
He said: “Of course, when every day people are talking about the price tag they are waiting for something for this money,’ ‘You can do nothing about this price, it’s just what you have on your back.”
“Of course people see you with another view and expect even more than with someone else, but I can understand that that’s a footballer’s and life and I just tried to give my best and perform.”
If Haller was a shadow of his former self in east London, a £20m move to Ajax at the start of 2021 would see him rise from the shadows and rediscover the goal-scoring touch that went missing at West Ham.
How did Sebastien Haller perform after leaving West Ham?
Having crumbled under the weight of expectation in England, Haller would become one of the deadliest strikers in Europe at Ajax, outscoring the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo, Kylian Mbappe and Mohamed Salah in 2021/22 Champions League campaign with 11 goals in eight appearances.
Across his first full campaign with the Dutch giants, he was described by Erik ten Hag as “phenomenal” and his freakish goal-scoring exploits backed up his manager’s claim.
Haller plundered an eye-watering 63 goal contributions in 66 appearances for Ajax across all competitions, earning him a £31m (€36m) switch to German outfit Borussia Dortmund last year, and he was tasked with replacing the goal-scoring machine Erling Haaland.
While the 6 foot 3 phenom was signed to fire Dortmund close to Bayern Munich in the race for the Bundesliga title, he received the devastating diagnosis of testicular cancer in July and was forced to undergo surgery to remove the tumour.
After fearing he would never play again, Haller made a remarkable return to action to make his debut against Augsburg on January 22nd and on February 4th, known globally as World Cancer Day, scored his first goal for the club against title rivals Freiburg.
Towards the end of that season, the 29-year-old showed West Ham why they were wrong to sell him once more as he chalked up eight goal contributions in the final four matches.
That all came while Hammers striker Michail Antonio only managed eight direct contributions across the whole campaign.
Hindsight is a beautiful thing, but in this case, perhaps the Hammers could have done more to extract the best from the effervescent Haller.
