Trevor Brooking has called on West Ham's owners to let boss Gianfranco Zola enter the transfer market. Brooking told The Sun: "It's important to see what happens over the next couple of weeks with all the speculation about which players may come and go.

"But I'd like to think the club will try to support Gianfranco Zola and Steve Clarke who have done really, really well. The way they've got the side passing is the West Ham way.

"There's a lot of talk about the financial issue. If you are the owners and you're looking to try to get some money back over a period of time, you'd like to think they'll take the long term view.

"If West Ham stay in a reasonable position in the Premier League for the next three or four years then the owners have got much more chance of getting a decent figure back than trying to do it in a short period.

"If you sell people now, you might struggle, could even go down and you've lost everything.

"It's trying to encourage those decision makers to see the potential. It's easy to say if you don't know all the financial issues behind the club but you'd like to feel that's the case and they can see that potential.

"If Gianfranco can get a couple of players in then we should be looking at a top half of the table finish again. If he doesn't you risk being dragged into that whirlpool of clubs that really just want to keep out of trouble.

"Both Matthew Upson and James Collins have been mentioned as players who may go. It may be that you have to sell a player to get a couple more players in.

"But what you wouldn't want to see is players go then nothing happens in terms of players coming in and then we're suddenly thin on the ground.

"West Ham fans would probably say right now the club is short of a couple of attackers, but if we can get those in then it's a strong squad with a good chance of doing well."