Onana Numbers Mind Numbing!

According to a raft of media sources including the BBC, West Ham have had a bid of between £28-40 Million depending on which source you care to use accepted by Lille for Amadou Onana.

The numbers involved in the deal for the 6'5" 20 year old midfielder are staggering for several reasons, so let's extrapolate the details. As recently as the end of May of this year Onana was valued at around £9 Million by Transfer market and listed as earning as little as £5,500 per week.

Fast forward ONLY 8 WEEKS and suddenly Hammers have offered a staggering 400% increase on his valuation to Lille which unsurprisingly they accepted for a player that they signed just under a year ago for around £6 Million from Hamburger SV, Lille will NET a profit of anywhere between £22-34 Million!

Apart from the massive mark up Lille will receive, it was initially thought that wages wouldn't be a problem due to the fact that Onana was rumoured to be on ONLY £5,000n per week, though that has since been dismissed as rubbish by a Lille insider who claimed Onana was paid £15,000 per week, triple the money but still chicken feed!

So news that the deal is being held up because of the player's wage demands must have hit Moyes and Co like a bullet. How much are his agency demanding? Apparently it is so much that it doesn't fit within the club's current wages structure, so reading between the lines it seems as if Onana's agent is asking for in excess of £120,000 per week!

Amadou Onana currently earns £5,500 per week, that's £286,000 per year playing for Lille, the 19 year old was born in Belgium and his current contract expires June 30, 2026 so Lille hold all the aces from a transfer point of view, with the exception that they are totally BROKE and desperately need to sell Onana to balance their books despite winning Ligue 1 the season before last.

The numbers involved in the transfer from Lille to West Ham for Onana are mind numbing, especially if you work for West Ham, it is an enormous investment in such a young player for the club and beggars the question if perhaps the club have gone so far down the road they don't want to back out for fear of failure in closing the deal, it is well known that PSG among others have been monitoring Onana's situation but that shouldn't force Moyes's hand.

We would suggest that there are some occasions when you just have to walk away from a deal, no matter how much effort has been expended, Hammers CANNOT and hopefully will not let themselves get 'seduced' into auction battles with Europe's top clubs, the East Londoners simply cannot compete.