West Ham join race for £30m Norwich defender Max Aarons

West Ham United are interested in signing Max Aarons this summer and the full-back has been told he can leave Norwich City.

The Hammers are keen on the 21-year-old as David Moyes plans for the future amid their top-four challenge.

Championship leaders Norwich – who made an instant return to the Premier League on Saturday – are likely to demand at least £30million.

Aarons was told last summer he would be allowed to leave Carrow Road this year and the Canaries are expected to keep to their word.

Norwich wanted to keep him to boost their chances of promotion after finishing bottom of the Premier League last year.

The England Under-21 international would prefer to stay in the south, in a blow to Everton’s hopes of signing him.

Tottenham have held a long-term interest since Mauricio Pochettino was in charge and Jose Mourinho’s sacking on Monday is unlikely to change that. Barcelona tried to sign Aarons last year, while Roma were interested in January and Bayern Munich have also been keen.

Aarons has made 127 appearances for Norwich, scoring four goals, since his debut in 2018 and helped them win the Championship in 2019.

The Canaries are five points ahead of Watford at the top of the table with three games to go and missed the chance to clinch the title after losing 1-0 to the Hornets on Tuesday.

Emi Buendia, who has scored 13 goals this term – including in Saturday’s 3-1 defeat to Bournemouth – is also likely to be in demand after Arsenal’s interest last year.

Promotion triggers Ben Gibson’s £8million permanent move from Burnley after the defender joined on loan at the start of the season, while Greece left-back Dimitris Giannoulis will also complete his transfer from PAOK after a loan spell.

Norwich need to offload Josip Drmic who, now promotion is achieved, will see his weekly wage return to around £50,000 despite not having played for the club since July. The striker has been on loan at Croatian side Rijeka since February.

Midfielders Moritz Leitner and Tom Trybull, who has been on loan at Blackburn, are also not in the Canaries’ plans.

They have continued to take a financial hit after failing to move Leitner on while Blackburn are paying a meagre £2,000-a-week towards Trybull’s wages.

Defender Timm Klose has been on loan at Basel and is also not part of boss Daniel Farke’s plans.

PA

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