David Moyes revealed he will spend part of the international break on a European scouting trip.
While Stuart Pearce and Billy McKinlay oversaw a recovery session at Rush Green on Thursday morning, the West Ham United manager and assistant Alan Irvine flew out to inspect prospective venues for the Hammers’ pre-season training camp this coming summer.
Irvine will spend two days in Germany, while Moyes will take in a selection of prospective sites in Austria. From there, the manager will head to his native Glasgow to watch Scotland take on Costa Rica in an international friendly at Hampden Park on Friday evening.
“I’m actually going to use the end of the week and over the weekend to go and visit the pre-season sites for where we’re going to pre-season, so I’ll try and go and get that done correctly,” he confirmed.
“On route, I’ll take in a game or two and see if I can see some of the players play in international games.
“I want to do it myself and make sure that we get things right. There are things that I’m doing that I’ve done in the past and I’ve got to go and see two or three training sites and I’m going to spend this weekend going and looking at pre-season camps and getting everything in place for the start of next season, really.”
I want to do it myself and make sure that we get things right
David Moyes
On his return to Rush Green on Monday, Moyes will likely bolster his training group with a number of young professionals, who will join the squad prior to the return of the Club’s full internationals throughout the week.
The likes of Nathan Holland, Alfie Lewis and Josh Pask all featured in Wednesday’s 3-1 friendly victory at Dagenham & Redbridge and could all be given further opportunities to impress in training in the early part of next week.
The thinking behind that is twofold – not only will it give the youngsters a chance to impress, but their presence will also enable the Scot to hold full-scale sessions ahead of the return to Premier League action at home to Southampton on Saturday afternoon.
“We’re training with a smaller group of eight or nine players and we’ll also use it to bring up some of the young players and give them a chance to show what they can do at the training ground as well.”
West Ham return to Premier League action with a home game against Southampton on Saturday 31 March.