West Ham loanee Jesse Lingard attracts European elites – report
West Ham could have their work cut out for them as they look to tie down England international Jesse Lingard to a permanent deal in East London.
The 28-year-old has been in the form of his life since joining on loan from Manchester United in January. His brace against Leicester on Sunday made it eight goals in nine starts for the Hammers, matching his career-best for a single Premier League campaign.
Now, according to EPSN, Paris Saint-Germain, Inter Milan and Real Madrid are all monitoring his situation, as well as the Irons, ahead of a potential summer transfer.
David Moyes’ side were having a fantastic season before the arrival of Lingard, but he’s taken them to new heights. West Ham have lost just once with him in the XI, away to Manchester City. With seven games to go, they sit fourth in the table, a point off of third.
World beater
This surely has to be the best loan signing in the history of the Premier League. We’ve run out of ways to describe Lingard and his impact at West Ham. It’s no surprise that there are now other clubs monitoring his performances.
During the 3-3 draw with Arsenal last month, Sky Sports pundit Paul Merson labelled Lingard as ‘outstanding’ for his first-half goal and overall performance.
He’s not wrong, either. Whilst we thought his switch in January was a positive signing for the club, no one could have predicted this. With his goals and assists we’re 11 points better off. We’d be in the bottom half of the table without him.
Since joining, Lingard has eight goals and three assists in 850 minutes of Premier League action [WyScout]. He’s averaging a goal involvement every 77.27 minutes, it’s crazy to think he hadn’t played a single minute in the league before February.
His future surely has to lie away from Manchester United. The forward has achieved so much in such a short space of time, the highlight being his England call-up. How United let a player of this quality be so starved of minutes is beyond us.
Hopefully, he continues his football with West Ham. It’ll be difficult to compete with the clubs mentioned, but he looks very happy playing for us and is adored by the supporters.
In other West Ham news, which of the current academy prospects are likely to break into the first team?