Home European football England David Sullivan regrets Carroll transfer.

David Sullivan regrets Carroll transfer.

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West Ham United chairman David Sullivan says that he has regrets over signing Andy Carroll, after the striker has had an injury plauged start to the season.

The striker spent a season long loan deal at Upton Park last season after being frozen out by Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers, Carroll enjoyed a successful League campaign at the Boleyn Ground, scoring seven league goals, but being a pivotal player in the West Ham squad, as they achieved a top ten finish in their first League campaign after promotion.

Carroll has not played for the Hammers since his permenant move in the summer, after sustaining a double fracture in his right foot.

He could be on the sidelines for another month or so, and chairman David Gold admits that he wouldn’t have gambled on the former Liverpool international, if he had known the striker would be out for such a long period of time.

Gold stated…..

“Had we known he would be out for this long, we would not have signed him,” Sullivan told the BBC’s Football Focus.

“We are not a rich enough club to deal with that. You know any player can get injured, but we can’t buy a player knowing he is going to be out for half the season.

“When we signed him we were assured by the medical staff that the very, very latest he would be back was 1 September. That would have meant he would only miss two league games.”

Carroll has returned to training at the club’s Chadwell Heath training ground in the past week, and Sullivan remains hopeful that the England international will come good.

“If you ask me the same question at the end of the season, I hope I will be able give you a different answer and say ‘Yes, it was the right decision to sign Andy Carroll’.

“He is a fantastic player and on his day he is unplayable. We love him and that is why we signed him. He is desperate to come back ; he is sweating blood in training.”

Manager Sam Allardyce will be sweating over the Carroll situation, as the January window comes closer, with the Hammers boss looking at targets such as Diego Milito, and Obafami Martins, as the Hammers are pearched above the bottom three.

“If you ask me the same question at the end of the season, I hope I will be able give you a different answer and say ‘Yes, it was the right decision to sign Andy Carroll’.

“He is a fantastic player and on his day he is unplayable. We love him and that is why we signed him. He is desperate to come back; he is sweating blood in training.

“He has been all over Europe for treatment and he has begged me to come home,” said Sullivan. “He has rung me up and said ‘It is doing my head in being here, I really want to get back as soon as possible, I really want to play’.

“Even now we haven’t got a date that he could be back. He could be back in three weeks, he could be back in six or eight weeks. I hope he might make a contribution in the next three or four weeks, that might be 20 minutes as a sub.

“He is not going to be quite the player he was at the end of last season until he has played some games.

“He is a fantastic player, don’t get me wrong, but I only wouldn’t have signed him because I can’t have that amount of wages and that amount of transfer fee on a player who isn’t going to play a minimum 20 or 30 games a season, hopefully 38 games a season.”

By Ben Reardon

@BenReardon1

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