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WHZ View: West Ham should drop 24y/o in favour of summer signing
West Ham midfielder Pablo Fornals made a great start to the season for the Hammers but his form has dropped off dramatically in recent weeks.
Despite the side’s improvement in form under David Moyes, with West Ham winning three of their last four Premier League matches, Fornals has struggled to replicate his early-season displays.
After starting the season with two goals and two assists from his first seven league appearances, he has now gone four matches without a goal or an assist.
His recent displays against Aston Villa and Manchester United were particularly poor, with the Spain international failing to make a single key pass in either game (via WhoScored).
Against United on Saturday, the 24-year-old completed just 63% of his 24 attempted passes, while only Lukasz Fabianski and Angelo Ogbonna touched the ball less often out of West Ham’s starters (via WhoScored). While he took three shots, only one was on target and he was dispossessed twice.
With the Hammers chasing the game late on, Fornals was replaced by summer signing Said Benrahma and it looks increasingly as though Moyes should make the call and bring the former Brentford man into the starting lineup.
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Since his arrival on loan in October, he has made four appearances in the Premier League off the bench and provided two assists (via WhoScored). In just 80 minutes on the field so far for the Hammers, he has taken five shots and completed three key passes, while his displays at Brentford last season show just how dangerous he can be.
From 46 Championship appearances, he scored 17 goals and provided nine assists, completing 3.8 shots, 3 dribbles and 2.1 key passes per match on average (via WhoScored).
With tough fixtures against Leeds United and Chelsea coming up before Christmas, it is time to test out Benrahma and see if he can bring the spark that Fornals has been missing in recent weeks.
In other West Ham news, Hammers unfortunate to lose 3-1 v Manchester United