Lucas Paqueta has started the 25/26 season on fire, and with the betting allegations off his back, could he be a contender for Hammer Of The Year?

Lucas Paqueta arrived at West Ham United in August 2022 for a still club-record fee of £51m. In that time he has made 124 appearances scoring 24 goals and providing 14 assists for his teammates. These stats aren’t the greatest on paper, but this could be the year his numbers finally blow up.

Since Paqueta has been at the club, he’s always clearly been one of our most talented and entertaining players, but he’s never really put up the numbers to show it like Jarrod Bowen has consistently and Mohammed Kudus did in 23/24 for example. But last season his number got even worse, he scored just four goals and made 0 assists in 36 appearances in all competitions.

We all know his form dipped because of his court-case, the FA either investigating him or he was on trial for well over a year. Not only that, he also missed out on his dream move to Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City because of these allegations. Lucas Paqueta is known for being a very emotional player, and you could tell it was getting the better of him.

However, after being found innocent, you can tell the Brazil international has a new lease of life, he looks so much happier on and off the pitch, and you can tell that with his performances early on this season. Despite a poor start for the Hammers, the 28-year-old has been excellent.

After four matches for his club Paqueta has three goals, a man of the match performance against Nottingham Forest and a goal of the month nomination for his screamer against Chelsea. Not only that, he marked his return to the Brazil national team, now managed by Carlo Ancelotti with a goal in a 3-0 win against Chile last night.

He is yet to assist this season, now making it 48 competitive matches without an assist for the Lyon midfield, this really isn’t acceptable for any midfielder, let alone a player with the world class ability he has. However, despite not setting up a goal this season, he definitely isn’t far away. His general midfield play is improving and he has played a couple of nice through balls already this season.

With Bowen, Wilson and Summerville ahead of him against Tottenham and beyond, I can see him ending his assist drought very soon, and once he does he might start assisting more consistently. If he can keep scoring goals at the rate he is now, and start creating more chances like we know he can, Paqueta really could challenge our talisman Jarrod Bowen for Hammer of the year.