Another injury for West Ham with key defender sidelined for a few weeks

In the final week of the summer transfer window, Turkish club Galatasaray expressed an interest in signing West Ham defender Emerson Palmieri to bolster their squad in this season. However, a move didn't materialised and Emerson stayed at the London Stadium as he is the only reliable left back in Julen Lopetegui's squad. Although the Hammers have experienced fullback Aaron Cresswell, he is 34-year-old and doesn't possesses a good recovery pace and isn't great while making successful key passes going forward. 

However, West Ham will need to rely on Cresswell in the upcoming matches as the former Chelsea defender has picked up an apparent injury in the 1-1 draw with Fulham. Around the hour mark, Emerson felt some discomfort and had to be substituted with Vladimir Coufal replacing him at the left back position. After the match, manager Julen Lopetegui spoke about Emerson and confirmed his injury, which means that the UEFA Champions League winning defender will highly likely miss the massive upcoming matches against Chelsea and Liverpool. 

Another injury for West Ham with key defender sidelined for a few weeks

In the transfer window, West Ham were considering bringing in another left back to provide more competition and quality to the left side of the defence with the Hammers interested in signing versatile Fenerbahce fullback Ferdi Kadioglu. Despite being rumoured to bring in Kadioglu, West Ham didn't entered into negotiations with Fenerbahce to sign him as they had to bring other transfer targets such as Aaron Wan-Bissaka and Carlos Soler to bolster their squad. Now, with Emerson getting injured, manager Julen Lopetegui needs to make a lineup decision on whether to bring Cresswell at left back or play Vladimir Coufal instead, as in the Fulham match. 

Cresswell and Coufal both have been great performers at West Ham, but now they struggle to defend against quality Premier League wingers. Another option for West Ham can be to play Guido Rodriguez at left back and play Carlos Soler in a double pivot midfield role alongside Edson Alvarez, allowing the Hammers to strengthen their defence.