West Ham United transfer update: Ibrahim Osman deal collapse controversy in dispute as Brighton and Crystal Palace interested
The reason for Ibrahim Osman’s West Ham deal collapsing appears to be in dispute after the expected signing hit a brick wall amid controversy on 28 January.
Journalist Ben Jacobs reported via Twitter later the same day that FC Nordsjaelland were insisting on a €25million fee [£21.3m] which the Irons were refusing to pay for the 19-year-old, and denied that agent fees were at the root of the issue.
He suggested that with Brighton and Crystal Palace also interested the Ghanian could still move before the deadline, but the price between the clubs was the stumbling block.
This was after a report from BT in Denmark on 28 January which had claimed the deal had fallen through in “total chaos” after an “unheard-of” demand for payment from an agent who was not even allowed to be negotiating on Osman’s behalf.
And the journalist who reported that surprise development, Farzam Abolhosseini, then challenged Jacobs on his reporting via Twitter, pointing to the fact that the Danish FA (DBU) had released a statement saying that Mitch Bakkovens was not the correct agent as Daryll Powell was, and disputed the claim that Nordsjaelland wanted more money.
Jacobs wrote: “Issue with West Ham is price not agent fees. Nordsjælland holding out for around €25m. West Ham don’t want to pay this.
“Brighton and Palace the other clubs who have looked at Osman. Still a chance he ends up in England before the window shuts.
“I suspect if they do come back and go higher it will be structured in a bonus/appearance heavy way.”
But Abolhosseini replied: “You write that there’s no issues with the agents, or am I getting this wrong? Have you seen the quotes from the Danish football association?
“FC Nordsjælland is not asking for 25 million euro. Get your facts right, please.”
Drama
It would be a pretty wild claim if the rogue agent demanding outlandish fees wasn’t actually behind this, and Abolhosseini’s reporting on Right to Dream academy graduates leaving Nordsjaelland this month has been pretty strong so far, after he also broke the story of Mohamed Diomande’s move to Rangers [Abolhosseini, 23 January].
It may be that with whatever fee Bakkovens was supposedly demanding it would have taken the value of the whole deal up to the level that Jacobs has cited, after the Irons had bid a “huge” £15.4m originally.
But with the DBU statement clearly suggesting something is amiss with the representation involved in the deal, it looks like the situation is indeed a complicated one.
In theory it should be possible for the incorrect representation to be cut out and a deal for the young winger to be picked up again before the deadline.
But if West Ham have been negotiating with the wrong person it may be easier said than done to start up new talks in the final dew days before the deadline.
And if the Irons hierarchy have potentially made a mistake it is possible that they are now looking to save face by suggesting that it’s just that the asking price is too high.
Either way it is a bizarre turn of events when it looked last week as if Osman would be on the way in as a matter of course to join Kalvin Phillips at the London Stadium this month, and whether the deal gets done or not now looks a lot less likely.
In other West Ham news, a striker wants to move to the Irons this month and he has waiting for a bid to arrive.
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