Luis Diaz to West Ham was “far down the line” in January after Moyes phone call

West Ham were extremely close to landing Luis Diaz in January before he was snapped up by Liverpool.

The Hammers – who are fighting for a Champions League spot – have been on the lookout for another striker ever since they sold Sebastien Haller to Ajax in 2021 after his failed spell.

David Moyes’ side have only Michail Antonio and Nikola Vlasic among the squad as their only out-and-out strikers and consequently tried to secure Diaz in the transfer market last month.

And their manager said that the move for the Columbian had progressed well before he opted to go to Anfield, signing a five-year contract in a move worth £37.5 million with £12.5 million in potential add-ons.

"I spoke to Luis Diaz on the phone, we were quite far down the line to sign him from Porto," Moyes said.

"My understanding was that Liverpool planned to come in in the summer, so we thought we'd try and get him in January. I don't know if that affected Liverpool's decision, but he's a really good player and we didn't get him.

"Our ambitions are to sign the best players we can to try to improve West Ham. I want to make us better, I don't want it to be mediocre if I can help it.

“Sometimes, you just need to be patient, hope we get the right things at the right time, and that's the way I've chosen to make my decisions here rather than bring in people who maybe don't right fit the bill."

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West Ham also tried to re-sign Jesse Lingard after his brilliant stint in east London last campaign when he joined on loan – but United decided to keep their former academy player, meaning the Hammers made no new additions.

Meanwhile, Moyes spoke about the chance West ham have in their Europa League Round of 16 tie against Sevilla next month.

He said: "I'm not giving up on being in and around the top. We've been in the top four positions on two periods this season, we've dropped out, and our plan is to get back into it a third time and stay there.

“But we've got to find the best squad to get that. We've not been on our best form, but we've been resilient, dug in, tried to keep going.

"A couple of things haven't quite gone our way, we'd like to see more goals from Michail Antonio, more goals from Tomas Soucek, it would be important to us, but it's not our goal scoring issues which have been a problem, it's been conceding goals. We've been without Angelo Ogbonna and Kurt Zouma for a long period."

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