West Ham co-owner David Sullivan has launched an attack on former manager Manuel Pellegrini and his director of football Mario Husillos over poor recruitment during their 18 months in east London.
Pellegrini was appointed Hammers manager in the summer of 2018 on a three-year contract worth £8million a year to replace David Moyes, who kept the team in the Premier League after Slaven Bilic was sacked.
Sullivan chose to appoint the experienced Chilean and allowed the manager to bring with him Mario Husillos as his director of football after the pair worked together at Malaga.
The duo smashed the Hammers' record transfer fee three times in 18 months, first on Issa Diop and then Felipe Anderson in the same summer. A year later, Sebastien Haller arrived for a record £45million fee.
Ryan Fredericks, Lukasz Fabianski, Jack Wilshere, Andriy Yarmolenko, Lucas Perez, Fabian Balbuena and Carlos Sanchez also arrived in that first summer as West Ham finished tenth in the Premier League.
In 2019, the South American's splurged on Haller, Pablo Fornals and Albian Ajeti as well as recruiting free agents Roberto and David Martin.
For the Carabao Cup clash against Hull City on Tuesday night, Anderson, Haller and Yarmolenko all started in a second string team that beat the Tigers 5-1 at London Stadium having found themselves out of favour since Moyes replaced Pellegrini at the back end of last year.
Speaking to talkSport Sullivan, who let control of transfers go to Pellegrini and Husillos for 18 months, said he regretted allowing them to do so.
Ajeti, Perez and Sanchez have all departed the club since. Yarmolenko and Wilshere have struggled badly with injuries. Anderson, Haller and Balbuena are all out of favour and Roberto was so bad the Hammers are having to pay half of his wages at Real Valladolid just to get him away from the club.
"Under the previous regime the only players I picked were Diop and Fabianski, all the other players him [Pellegrini] and his director of football picked," Sullivan said.
"I regret in a way not stopping some of the signings but you have to back the manager.
"We are not Roman Abroamovich, the King of Qatar or Abu Dhabi, even they have got some sense in value now and they wont overpay. We wll go a little bit more but you cant double.
"Nobody is right all the time. Everybody makes good and bad buys. I left it to the previous regime and they didn’t buy well. The fans were on my back to have a Director of Football a big name manager, we did what the fans wanted and it didnt work."
The Hammers co-owner has come under fire this summer for a lack of investment in a squad that only narrowly avoided relegation last season. Moyes wants to sign centre back James Tarkowski but the Hammers look like they could be priced out of a move,
The co-owners al revealed he has bids in for "two or three" players having sold Grady Diangana to West Bromwich Albion for £18million earlier this summer to boost the transfer budget.
