West Ham United ready £34.8m bid to sign Juventus star Manuel Locatelli amid contract news
West Ham are ready to bid £34.8million to sign Manuel Locatelli from Juventus, according to TuttoJuve.
The Italian news outlet reported via their website on 27 October that Juve are desperate to keep the 25-year-old Italy midfielder and are preparing to negotiate a new and improved contrast with him as soon as possible.
TuttoJuve doesn’t say whether West Ham are going to try and sign Locatelli in January or next summer but Calciomercato reported on Tuesday (24 October) that the defensive midfielder could be a successor to Tomas Soucek in the Hammers side.
Star-quality signing
If West Ham want to continue elevating themselves to the next level then Locatelli is the kind of player they need to be looking to sign.
While there are obviously gems in the lower reaches of England and outside of the major leagues in Europe, the Irons have started to find themselves shopping at big clubs.
In the summer just gone, two players were signed from Ajax and last year, players were brought in from Paris Saint-Germain, Chelsea and Lyon.
Now, one of Juventus’ star players is being linked with us.
Locatelli, once dubbed “phenomenal” by Roberto Mancini, has been a mainstay of the Juve side since initially joining them on loan from Sassuolo in 2021.
He joined Juventus permanently in the summer just gone after a stellar two-year loan spell but clearly, he’s upped his game further for West Ham to want to sign him already and for Juve to already want to offer him a new contract.
Due to that, however, we doubt that this deal will be one that happens.
Locatelli has more of a chance at winning silverware at Juventus this season so a January transfer isn’t going to be on the cards while a summer move could depend entirely on where the Irons finish this season and whether they qualify for Europe again.
In other West Ham United news, a Sky Sports pundit expectedly was wowed by this “outstanding” Irons player despite the defeat to Olympiacos.