How will West Ham look back on Chicharito’s time with the club?

West Ham decided to move on from veteran striker Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez on the deadline of the European transfer market. After a tumultuous time with the club, how will Chicharito be remembered for his time at West Ham?

If we want to talk business-wise, this deal looks like a good bit of business by Manuel Pellegrini and the West Ham board. The Hammers signed Chicharito in 2017 for a fee of £16m from Bayern Leverkusen of the German Bundesliga. Just over two years later, with just ten months left on his contract, the Hammers have recouped £7.2m of that deal from Sevilla.

If Sevilla secure Champions League football this year, the deal raises to £8m, giving the Hammers more than half of what they paid Leverkusen for Chicharito initially.

Listen, there’s no mincing words about it – West Ham and Chicharito were not a match made in heaven, and when Slaven Bilic was sacked, it only made things worse for him at the club. Slav transferred him in in hopes that the Mexican striker would lead the line amongst Dimitri Payet, Manuel Lanzini, and Michail Antonio, but he failed to make an impact as a solo striker.

David Moyes barely looked at him in his short stint with the Hammers, despite some crucial goals Chicharito scored for him in the race against relegation. Onto Pellegrini, the Chilean wanted to keep him last summer after the World Cup and invested the number nine shirt in him this offseason, only to sell him when a solid offer came in.

It’s clear that he was bought under the belief he could do something that he simply could not, and became a puzzling conundrum for Bilic’s replacements.

With Sevilla scooping him up, Hernandez gets his dream of returning to a less physical La Liga in Spain. His style of play will suit that league much better and there is no doubt he’ll score goals for his new club this season, but that shouldn’t give you pause about the Hammers selling him.

In my eyes, Chicharito was a name-brand player who took a chance on West Ham to get him back into the spotlight in the footballing world. Not a lot of players still in their prime (he was in his 20s when he signed here) would do that, so I respect him for that decision. Plus, he has always stated that he wants to play more football for West Ham and solidify a starting position.

With at least £7.2m in the pockets of the club and £140,000 off the wage bill in the clubhouse, I am at peace with this move. Yes, the Hammers are left a little short at striker, but I fully trust Pellegrini to either ride it out (until we recall Hugill) or give a lifeline to a free agent *cough* Bony *cough*.

Thank you, Chicharito, and best of luck moving forward with Sevilla. You gave West Ham more than a few goals when times were tough and always wanted to play more for the club. Enjoy the ride off into the Spanish sunset.