Massive in Newham

It was worth West Ham winning a trophy after 43 years just to receive this accolade from the Newham Bookshop. Good to meet Vivian and John again on my recent visit. And as always plenty of Hammers books in stock.

Some good signs Down Under

Well, we've lost a midfielder to some small trophy-less club in north London and now the real transfer activity begins. West Ham seem to have been knocked back in a loan attempt for Harry Maguire and a centre-back isn't a priority. Aguerd and Zouma are a decent pairing with Ogbonna and Kehrer as back-ups. 

Slabhead Maguire would certainly be better in a team that plays deep like West Ham and was a fine player at Hull and Leicester, though his confidence has been shot at United. A loan deal might have been a free hit for an England defender who once cost £80m, but midfield has to be the priority. The bid for Fulham's Palhinha is encouraging and Ward-Prowse would certainly add guaranteed goals from free-kicks.

Meanwhile the 3-2 victory against a strong Spurs side in Perth is good news even if the defending was a bit worrying - and a big gate of 46,000 gave it some proper atmosphere. Scamacca took his late winner very coolly and if fit this season could finally show what he's about. DIvin Mubama also scored a cracking header to add to his goal against Perth Glory and could add something up front in his breakthrough season. Also some good game time for the likes of Freddie Potts and two wins out of two.

We had a terrible start to last season losing the first three games. Hopefully some impetus from pre-season can see something much better this time round.

Hair we go

The Daily Mail has revealed that Danny Ings has had a £17,000 hair transplant at the Mayfair Hair Clinic in London. Will it be a hair-raising season for Danny? Or will he be another hair today gone tomorrow Hammers striker now he has baldly gone where lots of footballers have gone before? Guess he can always sign for Barnet.

All change at West Ham

A lot going on behind the scenes at the Hammers. Mark Warburton has left (rumour has it he was more attack-minded than Moyes) and now Paul Nevin has gone to Strasbourg with Patrick Vieira. Having already lost Alan Irvine and Stuart Pearce last season Moyes will be wanting to get some of his own men in quickly. Meanwhile Tim Steidten the new Technical director of football has arrived from Bayer Leverkusen. Transfers will apparently be decided by Moyes, Steidten, Noble and David Sullivan, which sounds rather an unwieldy system.

Meanwhile the Guardian's Jacob Steinberg reports that Southampton are interested in Flynn Downes, who might be a good makeweight in any deal for James Ward-Prowse. The Irons are also said to be interested in Everton's Onana, Fulham's Palhinha, Man United's Scott McTominay and Denis Zakaria from Juventus as possibly replacements for Declan Rice - whose transfer is taking several millennia. Please just get it over with.