Julen Lopetegui has vowed to make a "big, big noise" at West Ham United after his appointment as David Moyes' successor was confirmed on Thursday.
Lopetegui, who has signed a two-year contract with the option of a further year, will officially take over as West Ham's new head coach on July 1 after rejecting other offers since leaving Wolves in August last year.
"We will try to leave our mark on the club," said the Spaniard. "I feel like we have a fantastic platform. I think that the past years have of course been very good years to have this foundation, but my ambition as a coach is always to get better and better, to achieve bigger and bigger goals and to encourage and support the players, the team. improve. and to compete, because this is what football is all about: to compete. We are very ambitious in this regard.
"I am where I want to be. I'm here because I want to be here and for us it was a fantastic day when we signed our agreement here because we are 100 percent committed to being here. We had other opportunities, but I am very happy that West Ham chose me, because I also chose West Ham, so we are very happy with this.
"We came here with the idea and the thought of making a big, big sound. That's why we came here and we're excited about this challenge. We will of course do our best to help the club and the team achieve our objectives. I assure the fans that they will be key in all our achievements."
Lopetegui, former manager of Spain and Real Madrid, won the Europa League with Sevilla in 2020.
West Ham technical director Tim Steidten said: "Julen lives and breathes football. He thinks deeply about the game, is tactically astute and has shown that he can adapt to work in different competitions, in different countries, with national teams, and in every situation he has shown his excellent qualities."
Lopetegui's in-tray at West Ham
Fix the defense
Only three Premier League clubs conceded more goals than West Ham last season - and all three (Sheffield United, Luton Town and Burnley) were relegated to the Championship. Moyes has built much of his managerial reputation on making his teams difficult to break, but that simply wasn't the case during his last campaign in east London.
West Ham's 74 goals conceded in the 2023/2024 season marked a worrying defensive deterioration compared to previous seasons. In the previous three seasons they conceded an average of 51 goals per season.
The loss of Declan Rice, who joined Arsenal last summer, played a major role in this defensive weakness. After all, Rice is one of Europe's most effective defensive midfielders. But there are also structural issues that Lopetegui needs to address, and concerns over the form of key figures at the back.
Wingers Vladimir Coufal and Aaron Cresswell are past their best, while the performances of Kurt Zouma, Konstantinos Mavropanos and Nayef Aguerd have been patchy for some time. We can expect West Ham to strengthen their defense during the summer transfer window.
Solve problem #9
Over the past decade, West Ham have gone through an absurd number of attackers in an attempt to ease the burden on Michail Antonio or replace him as the main focal point of their attack. They have consistently failed to find the right man, and Antonio (now 34 years old) remains the first choice No. 9.
Gianluca Scamacca, Danny Ings, Sebastien Haller, Lucas Perez, Marko Arnautovic, Javier Hernandez, Jordan Hugill, Jonathan Calleri... we could go on. All of these players have tried, but all have failed (to varying degrees) to provide a long-term solution. In reality, most of them didn't even manage to provide a short-term solution.
West Ham's dependence on Antonio has gone on for too long and needs to be addressed, both during the transfer window and on the training pitch. Jarrod Bowen has shown some potential as a striker this season - could he be developed further in that position by Lopetegui?
Working within the new structure of the club
The appointment of Tim Steidten as technical director in July last year marked a shift in West Ham's backroom setup. It also marked the beginning of a difficult relationship between the manager and those at executive level. Moyes wanted things done a certain way, while Steidten had different ideas.
Throughout much of the campaign there were persistent whispers of tension between the two men. Moyes has always wanted to have a big say in transfer transactions and he had his own thoughts on which players West Ham should target.
Those tensions reached new levels at the end of the campaign, when Steidten was actively (and quite publicly) trying to find a replacement for Moyes. It was even agreed that Steidten would no longer have access to the first team areas while Moyes was around, which spoke volumes about the problems behind the scenes.
Such friction helps no one. Lopetegui apparently needs to find a way to cooperate more with the powers above him. On this front, his experience at Wolves does not bode well; he left the club due to frustrations with the club's budget and spending options.
Impose a defined, attractive playing style
One of the regularly voiced complaints about Moyes was that his style of football was too 'old-school'. Some sections of the West Ham fanbase demanded a more progressive, attacking style of play.
Was such criticism justified? That depends on your personal view. West Ham supporters certainly didn't complain when Moyes led the team to a gruesome 2-0 win at the Emirates Stadium in December. You could argue that such back-to-the-wall performances should be cherished in a league where the majority of teams now want to play the same way.
Likewise, it would be reasonable for West Ham to expect smoother attacking football given the attacking quality of their side. Lucas Paqueta and Mohammed Kudus in particular will certainly thrive in a more attack-oriented system. The potential problem for Lopetegui is that there is uncertainty over the future of both players, with Paqueta being important for Manchester City and Kudus attracting admiring looks from top teams across Europe.
