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Sell Or Keep – What Should West Ham United Do With This £15m Target Man?

West Ham United’s last season was hardly filled with any positives. After a brilliant 2015-16 season, when they finished in the seventh position and earned a place in the UEFA Europa League, and the move to a new stadium, a lot was expected from Slaven Bilic’s side coming into the 2016-17 campaign.

But, it turned out to be an extremely poor one, as the Hammers struggled to repeat the exploits of the past year. Halfway through the season, it looked like they were going to be involved in the relegation scramble, but a turn of fortunes since the turn of the year, helped them finish well above the bottom three in the 11th place.

A major factor for their disappointing campaign was the lack of goal threat upfront. Bilic’s main striker, Andy Carroll, endured another below-par campaign, marred by injuries throughout, which has raised several question marks over his future at the club. With a very crucial summer ahead of the Hammers, what should they do with Carroll? Let’s analyze;

Carroll has been an important player for the East Londoners since his move from Liverpool a few years back and this season he was expected to be the key target man to feed off of the brilliance of the likes of Dimitri Payet, Manuel Lanzini and Michail Antonio etc., and bang in plenty of goals over the course of the season. However, things turned out much more differently for the England striker than what was hoped.

When fit and playing, Carroll showed what exactly he can do, as he scored some spectacular goals this season – his strike against Crystal Palace one of the best in the Premier League this season. But, as has been the case with the big Geordie for several years now, once again a spate of injuries did not allow him to feature regularly for West Ham and with the rest of his strike partners not up to the mark, the team struggled. In the end, he just managed a total of 22 appearances across all competitions (15 league starts), scoring seven times and assisting two more.

Carroll who was bought for £15m should be entering the peak years of his career and there is no questioning that he is one of the best strikers to have been playing with the Hammers in the period of last five to ten years. But his tryst with injuries hasn’t allowed him to develop into the devastating forward that we all know he could have been.

West Ham need goals and they will need to invest heavily in a new striker if they are to fare better in the coming season. With Carroll’s injury history, it is unlikely that he will be able to play through the entire season without any issues and as a result, he cannot be considered a reliable player and needs to be sold. While it might come as a bitter pill to swallow, it is the time that West Ham move on from Carroll, for the club’s good.