Lucas Paqueta quite simply hasn’t done enough for West Ham United to justify his price-tag in my eyes.
West Ham paid a whopping £50 million to bring Lucas Paqueta to the London Stadium from Lyon in the summer of 2022 (BBC).
However, as much as he has thrilled the Hammers fans, he has disappointed us in equal measure with some really poor performances, especially over the past two months.
In fairness to Paqueta, he has been going through a really difficult time recently, after being charged with four separate potential betting breaches, and he recently released a statement in response to those allegations.
The Brazil international just looks like someone whose main focus isn’t on playing football right now.
Paqueta is incredibly talented, we all know that, but his performances have been underwhelming to say the least this season.
In fact, I think his numbers since joining West Ham are pretty poor, given the position he plays in.
The 27-year-old has actually been outscored since he join the Hammers by someone who left us more than two years ago during the same period!
Player who West Ham let go has outscored Lucas Paqueta since 2022
Paqueta has bagged just 15 goals and 14 assists in 94 games for West Ham, since he moved to the London Stadium in the summer of 2022 (Transfermarkt).
Meanwhile, Andriy Yarmolenko left the club in the same summer.
He scored some vital goals for the Hammers during his final two years at the club, notably his winner against Chelsea at the London Stadium in 2020 and his winner during our Europa League clash with Sevilla in 2022.
When he was released two years ago, many Hammers fans thought it was the right decision, given the huge salary he was on.
Since that exit, he has bagged 24 goals and 11 assists in 67 games for Al-Ain and Dynamo Kyiv (Transfermarkt).
That’s six more goal contributions than Paqueta, in 27 less games!
Now, I’m not for one minute suggesting that West Ham should have kept Yarmolenko, but it really could be argued that the £50 million we laid out on Lucas Paqueta would have been better spent on someone with more output inside the final third.
I will always be grateful for the Brazilian for his through ball to Jarrod Bowen in the Europa Conference League final in 2023.
However, he just hasn’t done enough for us over the past 14 months in my opinion, irrespective of his off-field problems.
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