West Ham United want to sign Le Havre starlet Etienne Kinkoue in late transfer push
West Ham United want to sign Le Havre central defender Etienne Kinkoue before the January transfer window closes, according to The Sun.
Writing on their website (30 January), the news outlet report that the Hammers wants to bolster their defensive options this month and Kinkoue has emerged as a target.
The 22-year-old Frenchman is highly-rated and trained under Antonio Conte during his time at Inter Milan, and has now attracted interest from Frankfurt and Red Bull Salzburg as well as David Moyes in a deal worth £10m.
“West Ham are targeting Le Havre ace Etienne Kinkoue ahead of Thursday’s January transfer deadline day,” they wrote.
“Kinkoue, 22, could cost as little as £10million but the Hammers face competition from Eintracht Frankfurt as well as Red Bull Salzburg.”
Highly-rated
Kinkoue isn’t someone that a lot of Hammers fans will know about much, but if he is as highly-rated as people are saying then it’s clear he’d be a solid signing.
Kurt Zouma and Nayef Aguerd are consistently being linked with an exit away from the club which means they won’t be around for much longer, while Angelo Ogbonna is ageing now and is on a downwards trajectory.
Dinos Mavropanos has been signed as someone for the future while Luizao was brought in to help develop and strengthen the future of the squad, and Kinkoue could be a similar type of signing.
For just £10m it would strengthen the squad today and secure a top young talent for the future, which is exactly what everyone knows Tim Steidten is good at too.
It’ll be good to see if this comes to fruition or if it is just the agent adding names into the mix to get a deal done, but we won’t have to wait very long to find out.
In other West Ham news, Pablo Fornals could confirm permanent exit in ‘next few hours’, personal terms a ‘formality’.
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