Nuno can land Conor Coady 2.0 for West Ham with ambitious Southampton transfer | OneFootball

West Ham United should try to sign centre-back Taylor Harwood-Bellis from Southampton ahead of the likes of Coventry City and Hull City.

West Ham United are returning to the Championship next season and The Hammers will be expected to challenge for the title and an immediate return to the Premier League.

Nuno Espirito Santo looked as though he may be leaving the club but the former Nottingham Forest, Tottenham Hotspur and Wolverhampton Wanderers manager will, in fact, be staying on at the London Stadium.

Nuno won the Championship title with Wolves back in the 2017/18 campaign and so his staying put in East London could therefore be viewed as a bit of a coup by The Irons.

What his squad will look like is anybody’s guess, with Jarrod Bowen’s future still likely up in the air as the England international reels from having been left out of Thomas Tuchel’s England squad for this summer’s FIFA World Cup.

There is also reported interest in Mateus Fernandes, and it would be a real surprise to see Crysencio Summerville playing Championship football again next season.

Further back there are also uncertainties with Axel Disasi’s loan move from Chelsea now ended, but one man that West Ham should do everything they can to sign and bank on in their defence is Southampton centre-back Taylor Harwood-Bellis.

Taylor Harwood-Bellis would be an excellent signing for West Ham

As exclusively revealed by Football League World, West Ham held an interest in one-cap England international defender back in the January transfer window before the arrival of Disasi, and West Ham should now make it a priority to sign Taylor Harwood-Bellis this summer.

Last summer, the former Burnley loanee was linked with a move to Portuguese giants Porto but, unlike Mateus Fernandes and many other bigger name Saints players, he stayed put on the south coast.

After a fairly average start to the campaign with Will Still chopping and changing his systems and team selection, Tonda Eckert once again managed to get the very best out of the Manchester City academy graduate.

A product of that City academy, Harwood-Bellis’ excellent ball-playing abilities once again allowed Southampton to get themselves on the front foot and become fairly relentless in the second-half of the season.

From mid-January onwards, Southampton went unbeaten until they succumbed to a 2-1 loss to Manchester City in the semi-finals of the FA Cup at Wembley Stadium.

They made headlines in the play-offs, eventually being disqualified from them due to ‘Spygate’ and then missing out on promotion, leading to reported discontent from the squad.

A defender that has won the title with Burnley, a play-off final with Southampton and then been a key part of one of the most impressive and extended runs of form of any Championship side in recent memory, Harwood-Bellis is a colossus at the level, and it is of no surprise that newly-promoted Coventry City and Hull City are interested in his services in the Premier League.

However, as they seek to bounce back at the first attempt, West Ham should be keen to make a statement and the signing of Harwood-Bellis would be just that.

Taylor Harwood-Bellis would suit Nuno’s style of football

When he led Wolves to the second-tier title in the 2017/18 campaign, Nuno Espirito Santo opted to play a three-at-the-back system with Conor Coady in the middle of their back three.

Coady, a former midfielder, was able to take his higher level of technical ability as a box-to-box midfielder and use that to help Wolves build-up from the back more effectively, while also being able to spray balls from deep in transition.

Harwood-Bellis’ ability on the ball is perhaps not to the level of Coady but, having come through at City, is extremely impressive, as shown by the fact he produced the most accurate passes of any Saints player last season. That Coady-like long-range attribute is also there with 4.7 accurate long passes per 90 minutes – as many as two more than any other Saints player.

Combining those attributes with the fact that he also made the most defensive contributions of any Southampton player, 9.9 per game – which is quite remarkable for a side that was second on the list for average possession and so simply had less defending to do, only further highlights just how impressive he was last season, continuing on from the imperious form he had previously shown at Burnley.

Whether Nuno opts to use Harwood-Bellis in a Coady-esque role or simply as a centre-back in a 4-4-2, where Harwood-Bellis shone for Saints last season, he would be a marquee player for the level once again.

Durable, having played the most minutes of any Southampton player last year, the 24-year-old is arguably the best centre-back in the Championship, and he would be a stellar addition for West Ham.