Here are your West Ham United headlines for Monday, June 1.
West Ham begin full-kit training sessions at empty London Stadium
West Ham are preparing to resume their Premier League campaign in an empty London Stadium by training at their home ground in full silence.
Not only that, but manager David Moyes put them through intra-squad matches in full kit, to provide something as close as possible to what the Hammers players will be treated to when competitive football returns.
The Mail reports that West Ham are the first Premier League side to use their home ground for such sessions with mini training matches lasting 60 minutes or less, though other clubs are expected to do the same before the competition resumes on June 17.
Five of West Ham’s remaining games are due to be played at home, with Moyes’ team returning with a home outing against Wolverhampton Wanderers after the fixture was postponed in March.
The London club are also due to finish their season with a home meeting with Aston Villa, a game which could be crucial in both teams’ fight against relegation.
Dimitri Payet feels he wasn’t pressured enough during West Ham spell
Dimitri Payet made a huge but extremely brief impact at West Ham, leaving the club after a season and a half to move back to Marseille.
And now, in an interview with Journal de la Île de la Réunion, via HITC , the French international has said the promise of pressure helped encourage him to return to L’OM after a more low-intensity time in England.
“West Ham is a popular but modest Premier League club. When I was not good, nobody fell on me. Here, this is not the case,” Payet said, explaining that pressure is “something I wear constantly”.
“You can’t fall asleep on your laurels. Even when I’m good and the team wins, you can always fault my performance,” he added.
Since returning to Ligue 1, Payet has 28 goals and 34 assists across 116 league and European games and topped the league for key passes per game in the 2019/20 and 2017/18 seasons.
West Ham face stumbling block in pursuit of Galatasaray defender
Everton have reportedly joined West Ham in the race for Galatasaray defender Christian Luyindama, and Africa Top Sports reports that Carlo Ancelotti has made the Democratic Republic of Congo international a top priority.
This may make things difficult for West Ham, who have been linked with a £15million move for the defender by Turkish outlet Takvim .
Luyindama, an international team-mate of West Ham left-back Arthur Masuaku, has been out of action since suffering a cruciate ligament injury in November.
He had only joined Galatasaray permanently in the summer of 2019, following a successful loan move from Standard Liege.
With five central defenders on West Ham’s books - Issa Diop, Angelo Ogbonna, Fabian Balbuena, Winston Reid and Goncalo Cardoso - it is unclear whether Luyindama would be targeted as a direct replacement for a departing player or intended to add depth at centre-back.
