‘Is Being Discussed’ – West Ham Work On Transfer Swoop | OneFootball

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West Ham United have Napoli star Lorenzo Lucca on their radar and a loan deal ‘is being discussed’ to take him to the London Stadium.

Lucca joined Napoli in the summer on loan, for a fee of €9m with an obligation to buy for €26m, from Udinese.

Napoli manager Antonio Conte prefers a 3-4-2-1 formation allowing only one forward to play at any given time.

The Naples-based club have favoured Rasmus Hojlund, on loan from Manchester United, up front, with Romelu Lukaku close to returning from the injury he suffered in August during a friendly match against Olympiacos.

Lucca has consequentially struggled for game-time and has not started a Serie A game since October, while also scoring only once in the competition.

Having earned a call-up to the Italy national side in June, Lucca has been overlooked during subsequent international windows, and will want to force himself back into reckoning, with Gennaro Gattuso pondering over his squad for the World Cup qualification playoff against Northern Ireland in March next year.

Napoli are also hamstrung by their wage bill, with wages having breached 80% of revenue, and will need to offload players before they can bring anybody in in January.

The situation has led to Lucca being proposed to various Italian clubs including Juventus, but West Ham are another possibility, according to the Italian daily Corriere dello Sport (via Calcio Napoli 24).

It is suggested that ‘a loan move is being discussed’ but it is not clear where Lucca will end up.

Having agreed to loan the out-of-favour Niclas Fullkrug to AC Milan, the Hammers are left with the injury-prone Callum Wilson as the sole senior option up front.

Wilson though is not being played with regularity by Nuno Espirito Santo.

West Ham have been linked with the 6 ft 4 in tall Jorgen Strand Larsen from Wolves and the the 6 ft 2 in Mojmir Chytil from Slavia Prague, with whom they did business with to bring in El Hadji Malick Diouf in the summer.

Lucca, at 6 ft 7 in, clearly fits the profile Nuno Espirito Santo is targeting, as he seeks to secure the club’s future in the Premier League.

A loan move could suit all parties, giving West Ham the chance to look at Lucca and only consider keeping him if they can retain their Premier League status.