Glenn: I'd Have Loved Izzet

Glenn Roeder admits that he would have liked to have been in a position to make a move for Leicester City midfielder and lifelong Hammers fan Muzzy Izzet this summer.

But he stresses that he is happy with his midfield, while admitting even loan deals for high profile players from certain countries are prohibitively expensive.

"We would have liked to have been able to afford Muzzy Izzet," admits Glenn, "but we are not in a position to be able to bring Izzet to the club financially - he is a very expensive package.

"He has a fantastic deal at Leicester, and we haven't got a transfer kitty anyway.

"Whether we like it or not we have to do the housekeeping and get that right. It is important that the club is always there for everybody.

"But, as I have said all along this year, I am not under any pressure whatsoever to sell any of our players that are worth a lot of money in the transfer market.

"We have several players that a lot of clubs in the Premiership would love to have, but we are not going to sell any of them.

"The other side of the coin, though, is that we are not in a position to bring in three or four high earners, but we can bring in two players hopefully that will give us strength in depth and when they have to play they are more than up to performing for West Ham."

Similarly, Johan Micoud at Parma - another player linked with the Hammers recently - is not a target, and Glenn says: "He is a fantastic player, Micoud, but we have got Trevor Sinclair, Joe Cole, Michael Carrick, Steve Lomas and Don Hutchison when he comes back in September - that is a fantastic midfield.

"Having said that, Micoud is at Parma and the salaries these boys are on is incredible. Some of the stories about the wages they are earning people would think are too far fetched.

"To be quite honest, though, we are finding that if the boys are from Italy and Spain, they are not far fetched - they are basically true.

"They are amounts of money we certainly can't afford, and you start to realise why clubs are nearly going broke if you are paying eight, nine or 10 players the sort of money they are earning - how can you possibly survive for more than a few years without getting into financial difficulty?

"That is why there are so many top class players around Europe that you can get on loan for a year - but they are out of reach because their salaries are so high and you can't afford to pay them unless you put the club in financial trouble, which we certainly don't want to do.

"We are always open to offers, if you want, but 99 players out of a 100 don't tend to be what you are looking for - and what you are led to believe.

"You get told they are wonderful players - but you have to keep looking."

As for the season overall, Glenn says: "We have to make sure that we can do what we did last year again, although we know it won't be easy after a terrific first season.

"But that is in the history books, and we can't live as a squad on finishing seventh last year. The new season is nearly upon us and we are starting from zero.

"We don't want to be in a position like last year, where we lost at Middlesbrough in September and were bottom of the table.

"We want to get off into a good start and hope it snowballs all the way through the season."