West Ham manager Manuel Pellegrini has claimed that he turned down the opportunity to sign former Manchester City and Barcelona star Yaya Toure.
The Hammers brought in many new signings during the summer transfer window as they look to gain a strong finish on the top half of the standings this season.
Things have so far gone according to plan as they have so far lost all three of their Premier League games played so far.
The midfield is one of the areas of concern for the Hammers.
The options which Pellegrini has at his disposal are Jack Wilshere, Carlos Sanchez, Mark Noble, Pedro Obiang and Declan Rice. The East Londoners are arguably short of quality in this department.
The Hammers were strongly linked with Toure during the summer and many would have expected a deal to go through as Toure had previously worked with Pellegrini while the two were at Manchester City.
While Toure is 35, he is still hungry as ever to compete at the highest level after leaving City at the end of last season.
Pellegrini has since revealed to the Daily Mail that he had the opportunity to sign Toure but decided not to in order to invest money elsewhere.
The Chilean said: “The words of the agent of Yaya were unfortunate,”
“Because I spoke with Yaya, I know how I appreciate him as a person, as a player. I think he is a very good player. In the moment that we were doing our squad list, that position was covered by other players. We need money to bring in other positions, so I explained to Yaya clearly why he cannot come here but I hope he will find a good and big club because he is a very good player,”
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