Graham Potter 'prepared' to offload senior West Ham player this summer

West Ham boss Graham Potter will have a big contract decision to make this summer, and he may already have made it. The new Hammers boss is continuing to implement his system on his new squad, and fortunes haven’t improved significantly just yet.

The Irons are now in 15th place, and they will be hoping to start climbing the table sooner rather than later, facing Brentford at home after the FA Cup weekend break.

In the meantime, with the winter transfer window now wrapped up, Potter can start planning for the future, with summer incomings and outgoings required. One of the decisions that will need making concerns veteran right-back Vladimír Coufal.

Coufal has been a tremendous servant for the Hammers, racking up 140 league appearances since his 2020 arrival. The £5.4million investment proved to be a very wise one from West Ham, but their need for the veteran is dwindling. The 32-year-old has made 15 league appearances this season, but he has only started eight of those games.

The Czech Republic international is out of contract this summer, and while he is a useful squad player, Potter may be forced to allow his contract to expire if Coufal himself does not want to play that role, or indeed if Potter has plans to strengthen the right-back position further.

According to former Premier League scout Mick Brown, Potter will be the man to make the decision, but it is not looking good for Coufal. “He’s done well since coming to West Ham,” he told Football Insider. “But they’ve brought Wan-Bissaka in this season and he’s done exceptionally well so far.

“So that’s knocked him down the pecking order a bit. We’ve seen Wan-Bissaka move to left-back at times if Emerson is left out, and then they need to call on Coufal at right-back. But at his age, he’s not going to get any better, so I can’t see him becoming a regular first-team player again at this point.

“It will be Potter’s job to decide what role he sees him in, and whether he’s part of his long-term plans, but I would suggest at the moment he probably isn’t. So from what I hear I think they’d be prepared to let him go if he isn’t seen as a key player any more. They’re going to assess the squad in the summer and solve the problems they need to solve, so if he leaves, they’ll be looking for a new option there.”

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