Former West Ham United striker Dean Ashton has hailed the impact made by summer signing Chicharito, describing the Mexican as “brilliant’ and “a lunatic”.
Despite the Hammers disappointing start to the season Chicharito has impressed for Slaven Bilic’s side, scoring two Premier League goals for the club since his transfer from Bayer Leverkusen.
The 29-year-old is likely to lead the line once again for West Ham on Monday evening against Huddersfield Town and Ashton has liked what he’s seen so far from the club’s new No17.
“I think Chicharito has been brilliant,” Ashton told whufc.com: “It’s always difficult to come into a new side and get off to a good start. What he does, which the fans love, is he gives absolutely everything.
I think Chicharito has been brilliant. He runs around like a lunatic and the main thing is he knows where the net is.
Dean Ashton
“He runs around like a lunatic. He puts himself about. He gets in the box. He’s not afraid to get a shot away when he gets the chance, and the main thing is he knows where the net is.
“Against Southampton we saw when he gets a sniff of a chance he puts the ball in the net. So far he’s done really well.”
Andy Carroll has also returned to full first-team training and could feature for the Irons in Monday’s contest. The No9’s availability already has supporters excited about the potential link between Carroll and Chicharito.
Ashton is one of those fans eager to see what damage the two forwards can do together.
Previously Carroll had a devastating partnership with former captain Kevin Nolan and Ashton reckons a similar understanding could develop between the two current West Ham strikers.
Ashton added: “I want to see Chicharito and Carroll link up. They have to work on it in training but there’s not many strikers who really enjoy playing on their own. There’s a real chance to make a pairing work there.
“People often say ‘big man and little man’ but in Andy Carroll you’ve got a striker who is arguably the best in Europe, or even the world, in the air and then you’ve got somebody in Chicharito who has the hunger to get onto those second balls.
“For Carroll it could be like when Kevin Nolan was in the team. The two linked really well and hopefully we will see that again with Chicharito.”
Ashton has also offered his thoughts on Monday's big contest with Huddersfield, which can be found here.