One surprise name made an appearance for West Ham in their friendly victory over Queen’s Park Rangers on Wednesday afternoon.
No, not Jack Wilshere (who did make an appearance), but under-23s striker Xande Silva.
The frontman hasn’t played much this season owing to suffering from a serious bowel obstruction almost a year ago that has ruled him out for much of the campaign.
The Portuguese striker returned to action in February having missed six months of game time and played in the final three games of the under-23s shortened season.
One substitute appearance and two starts later and Silva had scored in all three outings after making his comeback, picking up where he had left off last season and was nominated for the Premier League 2 player of the month award for March.
He got off to a flier by bagging a four-minute hat trick against Spurs just 11 days after joining the Hammers from Vitoria De Guimaraes and went from strength to strength.
Silva trained with the first team when Manuel Pellegrini was in charge in east London, with the Chilean handing the striker his senior and full debuts. After his injury, David Moyes has now brought him back and subsequently kept him around the first team squad.
It’s a huge boost for the striker but also gives a clue to what Moyes might be planning for the remainder of the season, which gets back underway on June 20 with a home game against Wolves on June 20.
Moyes has said he will need to use all of his 23-man squad with a run of six games in five weeks on the horizon between June 20 and July 26. After a three-month hiatus amid the Covid-19 pandemic, injuries are a real possibility when match action restarts.
In terms of a central, focal point striker, Moyes has just two at his disposal - Sebastien Haller and Albian Ajeti. The latter has barely played for the club since his £8million switch from Basel in the summer.
Under Moyes, Ajeti has accrued just six minutes of action, though he did play in the friendly win over Rangers and there are rumours he got on the scoresheet as well.
Haller meanwhile has had an up and down season, not necessarily all his own fault, but a return of seven goals isn’t enough for a £45million club-record signing.
Now, they both have a youngster breathing down their neck who hasn’t stopped scoring goals, when he has played, since signing for West Ham in the form of Silva.
Michail Antonio has also been deployed as a central striker on occasion but with Silva being drafted in, the likelihood of Antonio playing up front has surely decreased.
Moyes will have wanted to give everyone who he is thinking of using over the next five weeks minutes against QPR and the same again this weekend when they face Crystal Palace in another friendly.
Silva getting game time on Wednesday must surely mean that Moyes is thinking of throwing the 21-year-old a big chance when Project Restart gets underway in nine days time. It could well be a straight shot between him and Ajeti as to who could back up Haller for the remainder of the campaign.
Ajeti has seniority on his side but not by much and only six minutes of action since Moyes arrived back in east London does say a lot.
For Silva, who has been on the cusp of a breakthrough for almost 18 months (injury aside), Project Restart could be his big break.
