West Ham chief executive Scott Duxbury claims West Ham are keen to sign three players and rejected reports they were close to administration. The Hammers were taken over by CB Holding on Monday.

"We are a self-sufficient well-run football club and clubs or companies that are close to administration can't purchase multi-million pound players," he told Sky Sports News.

"We purchased Savio, we have just exercised the option to buy Illunga, we have just extended the contracts of Gianfranco (Zola) and Steve Clarke so it's absolute nonsense.

"We have never been close to administration and as long as I am here we never will be.

"He (Zola) has identified three positions where he wants to bring players in who he believes will improve the squad and the first-team.

"We are close to securing those three players so the team will just improve. Ideally, hopefully one of the players we can conclude in the next couple of weeks.

"But then the manager has gone on record as saying he wants pre-season to start so he can assess his squad and then further decisions will be made.

"The three players in question - hopefully in the next few weeks we will be able to announce something - but there is still a little way to go, but talks and discussions have gone well and are ongoing."