West Ham United will surely be heading into the 2023/2024 campaign full of confidence having not only won a major European trophy, but also guaranteeing another season of continental football due to their Europa Conference League success.
David Moyes will be hoping to juggle the demands of European and Premier League football better than he did last term, as the Hammers struggled throughout the domestic season, eventually finishing 14th in the table, winning just 11 matches, five fewer than the previous campaign.
With this in mind, Moyes may wish to improve the depth of his squad to better cope with the hectic schedule which is likely to follow during 2023/2024 and with Declan Rice certain to move on, he will surely have plenty of funds to play with.
The club have recently been linked with a move for Coventry City striker Viktor Gyokeres and Fabrizio Romano has claimed that the club are “ready to push” in order to bring him to London this summer.
He has been valued at £25m by the Sky Blues and this shouldn’t represent a problem for Moyes, especially considering he could be an ideal Michail Antonio heir.
Could Viktor Gyokeres join West Ham United?
A move is certainly a possibility considering that the club will be playing European football once again next term and the Swede may see this as a major incentive.
Having scored 14 goals across all competitions last term, Antonio was the highest scorer in the squad, showing that he is still clearly important to Moyes.
With just one year on his current deal however and the fact he is 33 years old, the striker is closer to the end of his career than the start and this indicates that the club should be targeting a player who could take over from him, with Gyokeres clearly the ideal choice.
Last season, the Sky Blues goal machine netted 22 times and also registered 12 assists across all competitions, scoring eight more times than Antonio, and he has a ruthless nature in front of goal.
Indeed, across 2022/2023, Gyokeres not only registered more goals and assists domestically than Antonio (32 to ten), but he also had more shots on target per 90 (1.19 to 0.84), generated more shot-creating actions per 90 (4.27 to 1.92) and managed more carries into the penalty area (105 to 26), suggesting that he was a lot more clinical in front of goal whilst being able to take the ball into the opposition box on a more regular basis in order to create more chances.
The “unplayable” talent – as once dubbed by teammate Maxime Biamou – has demonstrated his goal-scoring credentials in the second tier and the statistics suggest he outshone Antonio in range of attacking metrics last term.
Although untested in the Premier League, Moyes had success by luring Jarrod Bowen from Hull City to West Ham in 2020, and he has been repaid handsomely, with the Englishman registering 71 goal contributions in just two and a half seasons and the Swede could follow in the same footsteps.
For a fee of £25m, Gyokeres could exceed all expectations should he join the Irons this summer while becoming the perfect heir to Antonio in the process.