Nayef Aguerd - signed (30m)

[Coffee]

"OS West Ham United complete Nayef Aguerd transfer West Ham United are delighted to announce the signing of Morocco international defender Nayef Aguerd. The 26-year-old joins the Hammers from French Ligue 1 club Rennes on a five-year contract and adds further quality and depth to David Moyes‚Äô squad. He will wear the No27 shirt. Aguerd has enjoyed two impressive seasons with Rennes, enhancing the reputation he established at FUS Rabat, Dijon and with the Moroccan national team. Now, the left-sided player will continue his career in the English Premier League, where his combination of talents will see him provide strong competition for Craig Dawson, Issa Diop, Angelo Ogbonna and Kurt Zouma. ‚ÄúI was really excited when I heard about West Ham United's interest,‚Äù said Aguerd, an impressive individual who speaks fluent French, English, Arabic and Spanish. ‚ÄúWhen I heard about it, I knew I needed to go to the Premier League, because it‚Äôs a dream for every player. ‚ÄúWest Ham is a historic Club. I saw a few of their games this year, and I saw the fans and the atmosphere were fantastic, with the bubbles! ‚ÄúI talked with the manager and he showed me that he was very interested, so it was easy to choose to come to West Ham.‚Äù Aguerd was born in the city of K?©nitra in the north of Morocco into a footballing family. His father played in the Moroccan top-flight, while his uncle Abdelmajid Bouyboud was capped 34 times and appeared at the 1994 FIFA World Cup finals ‚Äì an achievement his nephew could emulate in Qatar later this year. As a boy, Aguerd represented local club KAC of K?©nitra before being scouted and recruited to the national Mohammed VI Football Academy in the capital city of Rabat, where he spent four years playing alongside the likes of Sevilla striker Youssef En-Nesyri. In 2014, aged 18, he joined leading club Rabat FUS, making 12 appearances in his debut season and attracting the attention of a host of leading Spanish clubs. After bulking up and working hard on his game, Aguerd then inspired FUS to their first-ever Moroccan Championship in May 2016, scoring a vital goal against Ittihad Tanger that all but clinched the title. After scoring in the 2017 CAF Champions League and impressing regularly for FUS over the next two seasons, Aguerd joined French Ligue 1 club Dijon in 2018. Two encouraging seasons for Les Rouges led to a transfer to Rennes, where he started the club‚Äôs first-ever UEFA Champions League match at home to Russian side Krasnodar and featured in four of six group-stage fixtures in the autumn of 2020. Aguerd has thrived at Roazhon Park, making 66 Ligue 1 appearances and helping Rennes qualify for Europe in each of the last two seasons. He scored twice in seven UEFA Europa Conference League appearances and started 31 Ligue 1 games as Rennes finished fourth last term. At international level, the defender was capped at U20 and U23 level before making his senior debut against Albania in August 2016. Two years later, he helped Morocco win the African Nations Championship on home turf. He is now a regular in the Atlas Lions‚Äô starting XI with 25 senior caps and was an ever-present in Morocco‚Äôs successful 2022 World Cup qualifying campaign and run to the 2021 CAF Africa Cup of Nations quarter-finals. Everyone at West Ham United would like to welcome Nayef to London Stadium and wish him all the best for his career in Claret and Blue."

[kylay]

"Mental discipline is something the gaffer instills and usually a sure sign the dressing room is gone. I don't remember too many howlers from him during his run to the semifinals of the world cup. It was all a bit nervy out there today and conceding the third was hardly the straw that broke our back. We didn't manage another shot on target after our goal so wouldn't have made any difference anyway. Aguerd and Zouma are easily our best pairing, and Aguerd is probably our best distributing centre back."

[Manuel]

"The error he made for the goal you do see almost every week now in the modern game, so I won't hang him out to dry for that, shocking timing though and we never recovered. Certainly not a rolls royce and he's not shit either, maybe peg him as an average PL CB who 'may' get better in time? There's a reason why none of the big boys fancied him."

[Eerie Descent]

"master, I think he could end up being a decent player for us, but 'loads of potential'? He's 27 mate. He makes proper glaring mistakes, I've lost count of the amount he's made. I didn't say it previously, but even against Southampton, the header that hit the bar, it was the man he was marking. Fair enough, the cսnt is 6'7, but he didn't even get his body in the way to make the header a hard one. I mean, he's far from our worst player (Soucek has that honour) but people need to stop talking about him in ridiculous terms. The geezer has been a bit of a disaster so far."

[master]

He's okay. Not brilliant. Has loads of potential. Unfortunately coached by a crap manager.

[Eerie Descent]

"This is the problem when everyone goes ridiculously overboard on a player. I still think he could become a good player for us, as I've said previous which gets totally ignored, but coming on here crowing after he put in nothing more than a decent performance against one of the worst attacks you'll ever see really is hilarious. I've given a very measured judgement on him, that what he has produced so far has been nowhere near good enough, and he needs to do more. I really don't know why everyone had to have a meltdown over that. Once again, he produces a glaring error at an absolute crunch time in the game, when we still had a fighting chance. Abysmal stuff. Needs to do much, much better as a £35mil player."

[Russ of the BML]

"He is a mustard player. The problem is Moyes. When you continuously set up with a striker isolated on their own the ball doesn't stay upfield and keeps coming back. It creates more and more pressure on the defence. Add to that the passenger that is Soucek. Total inability to keep the ball and move it forward and so, again, more pressure. Under a manager that plays positive, creative and possession based football ALL of the defence will look better. For me, Aguerd is the captain in waiting."

[Eerie Descent]

"He did well today, solid enough. Which is nothing less we should be expecting, against the worst forward line I've seen in a long time. Nothing I've said previous is incorrect though, he had been utter gash in the last few games, credit where it's due he was decent today. Let's see how he does against a proper team next up."

[collyrob]

Why would someone bump a thread from a month ago asking for it to be locked?üòÇ

[twoleftfeet]

"No one should ever take any notice of ED, he knows nothing about football."

[paulon]

Good player LOCK THIS SHIT

[BRANDED]

He aint as bad as the Kraut

[Eerie Descent]

"What do you mean 'nope'? Why are you trying to tell me what I'm doing, you odd bod? We disagree, Snide. That's fine. Let's give him another 12 games to get up to speed, and reassess. Maybe he'll be ready for our first game next season against Preston."

[Side of Ham]

"Nope, you are judging one of the few players who should be given a bit of a chance before being judged seeing as he’s joined a shitfest of a club that had not played well for the 6 months previous to him joining. Where you’ve gone over the top is you were hoping he would be the saviour because he cost loads in your view…. but it’s bang average for a club that was expecting to be in the hunt for a European spot. It’s you that’s gone way over the top…as soon as this gets bumped you love having a negative comment on him."

[Eerie Descent]

"Ah, bless his cotton socks. I'm judging a player on his recent performances (which have been shit) not spray-painting his house with obscenities, you absolutely fucking man-bag. I actually think the lad could come good, but he's not doing nowhere near well enough at present, and we need better. Costing goals every single game in a relegation battle is a big problem. Either way, he doesn't read WHO and will sleep well tonight, hopefully you calm down and do too."

[Side of Ham]

"Nope ED, they all need to do better he is not stand out in this purely because they've all needed to do better for over a year now..... ....you've just been a bit silly to try and single one of the poor sods who've basically signed on to not have the ball. He WAS the only new signing showing potential, now he's your scapegoat it seems, even though he hasn't been here for most of it 17 games you said right?"

[Jasnik]

"I think he is a good player and will get better,"

[Jasnik]

"I think he is a good player and will get better,"

[Eerie Descent]

"""he's not going to do better"" Finally, we agree. Took longer than anticipated, but we got there."

[Side of Ham]

"FFS silly boy....he's not going to do better as the team is set up to basically wait until the opposition can score and both his playing partners in the centre of our defence are continually coming back from injury......except he's not afforded that by the likes of you. Zouma has made many a fuck up and few seasons back Ogbonna was known as DOGbonna...... Because you can't name other players that are doing well this season this should tell a div like you that the WHOLE lot of them need to do much better.....not just single out a new bloke who has been just as injury prone as the rest of them, probably due to having to defend whilst the opposition are allowed to be camped in our half."

[Eerie Descent]

"No players are doing really well this season, and they've all been dug out. But anyway that's completely fucking irrelevant, you thick wally, this is a thread about Aguerd. If you're sensitive to him being criticised, maybe don't look at this thread, because he's not playing well and it's probably going to get mentioned. I didn't say he needs replacing btw, I said he needs to do better. Much, much better. And if he needs more time, as you seem to be suggesting, he's played 17 games and we've got 12 left. Let's hope it's not too long, and he stops the massive errors double quick."

[13 Brentford Rd]

The world according to WHO... A couple of good games and he's the next Bobby Moore. A couple of bad games and he's shit. Same has been said on here about many players.

[Side of Ham]

"Nope, I'm asking you to name players who are doing really well this season....according to you he needs replacing because we haven't got time have we, £35 million barely buys a squad player for where you expect us to be.....the only replacement is Ogbonna and everyone is digging him out for being too slow.....after coming back from a long term injury. Have a go at all of them because we've been shit long before this feller came in....."

[Eerie Descent]

"What an absolute non point of a post. Because others have been shit, we can't discuss him being shit. Ok The geezer isn't doing well enough. Nowhere near it. You said he hasn't had a run of games, he's played 17 times, and he's costing goals every single game. I expect a hell of a lot more for £35mil. You obviously don't."

[Side of Ham]

Name ANY of our experienced players who need to do that this season AND they've got the experience in the PL.....he hasn't got time ffs.....what you going to do then......

[Eerie Descent]

"He's played 17 games. He cost around £35mil, is an experienced player who is nearly 27 years old. We haven't got time for him to learn how to defend properly. Needs to be much, much better. I don't know why everyone has such a problem with calling certain players out when they clearly need to do better. Weird."