West Ham United should sell Lucas Paqueta in January and replace him with a ‘lights out’ left-winger to help keep us in the Premier League. 

The story of Lucas Paqueta has been laced with controversy, and while he’s clearly one of the most talented players West Ham have probably ever had, he’s just not been good enough, and had he not assisted Bowen’s goal in the Conference League final, it just wouldn’t have been worth the hassle.

But he did assist that goal, and a lot of West Ham fans, including myself, will always love him because of that. However, I think it’s now the right time to move him on, if we can get a decent fee.

If we can get at least £30m for the 28-year-old, I really think we should accept that. He has just a year and a half remaining on his contract, and there is absolutely no chance he will sign a new one. He’s not playing very well, he’s got disciplinary problems, and to be honest, I think we have a better player for his role.

Mateus Fernandes and Lucas Paqueta are two very similar players. I think Paqueta has more natural talent and is a lot more physical, but Fernandes makes up for that with his hard work and drive, two things I don’t think Paqueta really shows anymore.

The only real difference between them is that Fernandes wants to be here, while Paqueta, despite what he says online, very clearly doesn’t. Fernandes is also seven years younger and is a lot more of a long-term option, so we should invest in him as the most advanced player in our midfield rather than Lucas.

If we can get a decent fee for Lucas, we can invest the majority, if not all of that, in a left-winger. I love Summerville, but you just can’t rely on him, especially during a relegation fight. We need a left-sided Jarrod Bowen. That’s easier said than done, but he doesn’t have to be quite as good as Bowen; we need someone with his reliability and availability.

However, anything under £30 million would be hard to take because of the quality we know he’s got, he’s a starter for Brazil, and in what should be the prime years of his career. And you only get an average Premier League player for around £20-£25m now, and while he has been that recently, he has more than enough talent to kick on.

Nuno is doing everything right with him; he’s making him feel like our most important player, he’s consistently bigging him up, and telling the media just how good he is, but we need him to start showing it or he could be out the door sooner rather than later.