West Ham’s youngsters preparing to rise under Graham Potter’s new look Hammers this season

National World - LocalTV

With the new campaign fast approaching, there’s growing intrigue over which West Ham players could step up and shine under Graham Potter this season. That could be the key to unlocking more consistent performances from key individuals — and perhaps even elevating West Ham into the upper reaches of the table, we spoke to James Jones of LondonWorld for more.

Transcript

00:00with the new campaign fast approaching there's growing intrigue over which West Ham United

00:08players could step up and shine under Graham Potter this season. Potter the rival had understood

00:16in a fresh tactical approach blending his trademark possession game with the attacking

00:21threat already in the squad. While the summer has brought some new faces the bigger question

00:27is which existing players will flourish in the new system. With European football off the schedule

00:34this year the Hammers have the chance to focus solely on the league and domestic cups giving

00:40Potter more time on the training ground to refine his ideas. That could be the key to unlocking more

00:47consistent performances from key individuals and perhaps even elevating West Ham into the upper

00:53reaches of the table. We spoke to James Jones of London World for more.

00:58Yeah James I mean you know among all the madness the worries the concerns going into the new season

01:06it just seems like a perfect platform for one of the youngsters to step up and have a bit of a

01:11breakthrough season you know we've mentioned a few of them sort of made that impact in the first team

01:15this could be a perfect opportunity for them you know purely no issues financially if they are coming

01:22through that academy we've mentioned before some of the West Ham youngsters have been fantastic and

01:26gone on to have great careers and the connection they have with the fans who's maybe likely to

01:32possibly come and break that sort of barrier into the first team and you can see having a really

01:38positive season if he's given the platform. Well Oli Sculls he made his breakthrough last year

01:45somewhat surprisingly I think anyone expected it to be Sculls that came in and almost kept his place

01:52I think he started eight or nine in a row at one point so he's definitely won the club did confirm in

01:58an interview with Graham Potter on the website this week that Sculls, George Earthy and Keelan Casey

02:05are now fully fledged members of the first team squad which kind of does point to maybe what Graham

02:13Potter's thinking in that you know Keelan Casey is a centre-back maybe he can provide cover alongside

02:17Mavropanos takes the pressure off a little bit of having to go out and desperately buy one

02:22George Earthy had a really good loan spell with Bristol City last year

02:26you know perhaps you know he's impressed Graham Potter enough to be a part of his attack in his midfield

02:32so it's positive in terms of the youngsters there's a lot of youngsters coming through

02:37we've gone out and bought Daniel Cummings from Celtic

02:39we're led to believe he's coming to the he's going to go straight into the development squad

02:44but he comes with a lot of a lot of promise and a lot of pedigree and the hope is that maybe he'll

02:51get an opportunity as well up front he's a goal scorer he's scored a lot of goals with Celtics

02:55reserves last year so there are a number of youngsters that are knocking on the door but the fact that the

03:00club have already confirmed those particular three and Earthy Casey and Sculls as fully fledged

03:06first team players suggests that they're going to be involved next year I think we all expected

03:13Sculls to be involved but it's good to see that the other two look like they're going to get their

03:16opportunity as well and we all know that West Ham West Ham fans love a youth player coming through

03:20we've had so many over the years so many have gone on to achieve unbelievable things in the game

03:25so it's it's something that we're very proud of and it's good to see that it looks like Graham Potter

03:31is kind of buying into that tradition at the club and giving young players a chance and we saw that with

03:36Sculls last year and hopefully we'll see a lot more of it in this coming season had none of it none of

03:41those were his players so he had to make do with what he had a team that was well out of confidence

03:45well out of form and had been for a long long time and I think when you consider that I think he

03:52actually did quite a good job you know went to Arsenal and won at the Emirates went to Man United

03:56and won at Old Trafford there were some disappointing results where you probably would have expected us

04:00to win games that we didn't but that's part of the process when a manager comes in mid-season

04:05you know it's not it's not going to look very rarely do managers hit the ground running

04:09and it remained that way so I think we have to kind of almost treat Graham Potter as a clean slate

04:15from the beginning of the season and I still don't he won't be able to have just this summer to build

04:20the squad that he wants it's going to take a few transfer windows probably a couple of summers

04:24but I'm confident that he is the right guy that can get us back to where we we feel like we should

04:30be but it's not going to happen overnight but I can understand the fans concerns and worries

04:37given the current situation around the financials and the players that we're probably expecting to

04:43see leave the club

04:43so

04:49you

04:51you

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