West Ham United co-chairman David Gold has revealed the reasons for agreeing to sell Dimitri Payet to Olympique Marseille.
The Hammers agreed a £25million fee with the French club to send the 29-year-old playmaker back to the Stade Velodrome.
Regarding the transfer, Gold has divulged that Payet has been sold due to manager Slaven Bilic's wishes to keep a unified club after the player forced the issue of leaving.
The decision to allow Payet to leave was in accordance with the wishes of the manager and the interests of squad unity. dg
— David Gold (@davidgold) January 30, 2017
West Ham UNITED Football club is stronger today than it was yesterday. dg
— David Gold (@davidgold) January 30, 2017
We genuinely didn't want to sell DP and hoped to resolve his issues but slowly things got worse culminating with him refusing to play. dg https://t.co/iF2Wq2kjup
— David Gold (@davidgold) January 30, 2017
Additionally, co-chairman David Sullivan released a statement that iterated Gold's Tweets.
"The club would like to place on record its sincere disappointment that Dimitri Payet did not show the same commitment and respect to West Ham United that the club and fans showed him, particularly when it rewarded him with a lucrative new five-and-half-year deal only last year," said Sullivan's statement.
"I would like to make it clear that we have no financial need to sell our best players and that the decision to allow Payet to leave was in accordance with the wishes of the manager and the interests of squad unity.
"To be frank, my board and I would have preferred for him to have stayed in order to make an example of him, as no player is bigger than the club.
"I am confident that with the quality of the players we have brought in during January already, the squad will be stronger at the end of this transfer window than it was at the start.
"We now look forward to building on our recent good run of form with five league wins in the last seven matches as we focus on continuing our rise up the Premier League table."
