West Ham boss Moyes shares ‘unfortunate’ Alex Kral message
West Ham boss David Moyes has said that Alex Kral has been ‘unfortunate’ during his time in east London.
The Spartak Moscow midfielder joined the Hammers on a season long loan deal at the start of the season, with the option to buy the midfielder.
The 23-year-old’s future remains up in the air having made only one Premier League appearance with his parent club considering bringing the Czech Republic international back according to MetaRatings.
“Alex has been a bit unfortunate not to feature, but he had a period where he missed out a little bit with COVID in a period with more games. I would like to give him an opportunity to see what he can do.” Moyes said in his pre-Kidderminster Harriers press conference.
“Manu [Lanzini] has played particularly well. Alex is still getting used to the speed and whole situation. We’ve said many times, it takes some player’s time. Hopefully he’ll get some football in the second half of the season.
“I think you can see what we did against Leeds United: we were very strong. Our players are well rested, and we do have a Premier League game in midweek so that has to come into consideration.
“To beat Leeds in the third round was very good. We want to see if we can get through to the next round by beating Kidderminster.”
Bad timing
Kral didn’t feature in the last round against Leeds United but he should be nailed on for this one.
He is a hugely talented player having burst on the scene and stayed there aged 20 in the Czech First League, but it hasn’t quite worked out for him yet in England.
Unfortunately, Kral has joined the Hammers in a season like no other which has made it very difficult for him to break into the team.
The team have either been playing so well none of them deserve to be replaced or the games have been staked too high to give the new boy a shot.
This is something that is only expected to be heightened as the Hammers enter the business end of the season.
For that reason, Kral and Spartak Moscow would favour bringing their defensive midfielder back from his loan deal early, but West Ham are likely to oppose that with their squad far too stretched to let anyone leave.
Hopefully he finds himself having a run in the team at some point, so his London Stadium memories aren’t all bad.
In other Hammers news, ‘Freaks’ – Mark Noble opens up on West Ham retirement.