West Ham Fan View: Dimitri Payet must be sold

We all knew that it was coming. Whether we wanted to accept it or not, we knew that Dimitri Payet was going to leave West Ham soon after his stunning debut season at the club.

Slaven Bilic in his press-conference confirmed that Payet wants to leave the club and that “it will be hard to keep him happy.”

Now many of us, including me, did expect Payet to leave West Ham in the summer after being one of the best players in not only the Premier League, but also the European Championships. There were rumours that some of the top clubs in England such as Manchester United were interested in signing Payet.

A return to France was also suggested with Paris Saint-Germain looking to sign an attacking midfielder. Fortunately for us at the time, Payet did not leave the club and it appeared that we would build on the previous season’s success in our new stadium with Payet being the main man once again. However, this has not been the case and we have not reached the heights that we did last season.

We currently sit at 13th in the table and are no longer in the Europa League, EFL Cup, and the FA Cup. It’s no surprise that Payet wants to leave.

Bilic has said that “until he changes his attitude, he is out of the team and he’s not going to train with us” and that Payet has “refused to play for us”.

So should we sell or should we keep? For me, we should sell Payet in the January transfer window.

Why? It was clear from the start of the season that Payet was not the same player that we saw last season. The quality of his performances have dropped and he has often gone missing in games when we have been struggling.

Although he has had moments of genius and got us off our seats in awe, he has been inconsistent. Many fans have even questioned whether he wants to actually be playing at the club after watching him in some games.

This is not to say that he is no longer one of the most important players at the club, he is. But he does not look happy playing for us and this will only reflect in his performances as they have in the first half of this season with Payet only getting two goals and six assists in eighteen Premier League appearances.

It’s clear that he does not want to be at the club and do we really want to keep someone that does not want to stay? Bilic has said that the club will not sell him in January but with Payet refusing to play, what is the solution? Keep him out of the squad for the rest of the season?

This benefits nobody. Payet also signed a new contract in February, tying him down to the club until 2021. This means that we can get a high amount for him with Sky Sports reporting that we have already rejected a £19.1m bid from Marseille.

Selling Payet will undoubtedly be a huge risk given his importance to the team and his quality. There’s also the difficulty of finding a replacement as shown in our inability to sign top-quality players in the summer transfer window.

It appears that money is not an issue for West Ham as we have bid big for players such as Alexandre Lacazette and Michy Batshuayi yet neither ended up joining us. We could get over £30m for Payet but if we were to buy the wrong players as we did in the summer transfer window, is it really worth it?

This is the risk that the club has to take as Payet is on big wages and let’s not forget that he will be turning 30 in March. Given that he has refused to play for the team, there is no point in keeping an unhappy player. Bilic also said that “this team, the staff, we gave him everything, we were always there for him. I feel let down. I feel angry.”

He took the words right out of every West Ham fans mouth.