da mrbet： West Ham United are closing in on a deal to bring Luizão to the London Stadium in the January transfer window.
What’s the talk?
da fazobetai： That’s according to ExWHUemployee, who revealed in a recent post on Twitter that, following a number of reports suggesting that the Hammers were in talks for the 20-year-old centre-back, Rob Newman is indeed close to sealing a deal for the São Paulo starlet, with the defender’s switch to east London now looking to be very close to completion.
Regarding the Irons’ move for the youngster, the club insider said: “Luizao close now. Still a few things to do to complete but should happen and will be for the U23s for now. Newman [has] been looking at many South Americans after his period of time in Brazil recently.”
Huge coup
Considering just how impressive Luizão has been for São Paulo after his making his debut for the club earlier this year, coupled with the fact that the likes of Benfica, Sporting Lisbon, FC Porto, Fulham, Wolverhampton Wanderers, Juventus and the Red Bull group were all reported to be interested in the centre-back, the defender’s signing is undoubtedly a huge coup for West Ham.
Indeed, over his 14 Serie A appearances last season, the £860k-rated talent highly impressed in a defensive capacity, helping his side keep two clean sheets, in addition to making an average of one tackle, 0.7 interceptions, 3.8 clearances and winning 2.9 duels – at a success rate of 50% – per game.
The 20-year-old also chipped in going forwards, hitting the back of the net once, as well as making an average of 0.2 key passes, playing 2.3 long balls and completing 34.2 total passes – at a success rate of 88% – per match.
These returns saw the “highly-rated” – in the words of Toby Cudworth – centre-back average a very respectable Sofascore match rating of 6.79, ranking him as São Paulo’s 22nd-best performer in the top flight of Brazilian football last time out – an impressive feat considering Luizão only turned 20 years of age back in March.
Such a rating would place him ninth in the Hammers’ squad this term, above fellow defender Craig Dawson and only slightly behind Kurt Zouma as a marker of just how good the prodigy is.
As such, with both Angelo Ogbonna and Dawson potentially set to leave West Ham in January, coupled with just how exciting a ball-playing defender Luizão very much looks to be, the argument that the youngster’s signing is a huge coup for the Hammers is indeed an easy one to make – with the defender undoubtedly possessing massive scope for future development.