Bristol City legend follows David Moyes out of West Ham as Julen Lopetegui is confirmed as boss

Bristol City legend Rob Newman has followed David Moyes out of West Ham after the Premier League club confirmed Julen Lopetegui as their new manager.

Lopetegui has signed a two-year contract at the London Stadium with ex-Robins defender Moyes agreeing to step down towards the end of last season after five years in charge which included lifting the UEFA Conference League last season - their first trophy for 43 years.

Newman was hired as Hammers head of recruitment in 2021 having spent 13 years with Manchester City as international scouting and recruitment manager. Moyes and Newman were teammates in the City defence for three years, which included the Freight Rover Trophy win at Wembley in 1986.

During his time in east London the club signed Lucas Paqueta, Alphonse Areola, Edson Alvarez, Mohammed Kudus and James Ward-Prowse as notable transfer success stories. But the club’s decision to bring in Technical Director Tim Steidten in July 2023 seemed to spell the beginning of the end for Moyes and, as an extension of that, his staff.

Newman, who made 483 appearances for City from 1981 until 1991, seventh on the all-time list, is one of eight backroom staff members to have left West Ham this week, with first-team coaches Billy McKinlay, Kevin Nolan, John Heitinga and Henry Newman, first-team technical advisor Alan Irvine, fitness coach Nick Davies and head of performance analysis Jamie Osman also departing.

Reports have claimed Moyes has been approached by Russian club Spartak Moscow but in the short term the Scot will be working as a pundit for the BBC during their coverage of the European Championships in Germany.

Lopetegui joins West Ham having previously led Wolves in the Premier League, with the Spaniard departing Molineux last summer over frustrations in the transfer market, one of which was their failure to sign Alex Scott from City with the midfielder moving to Bournemouth instead for £25m. Wolves had seen two lesser bids rejected for the England Under-21 international earlier in the summer.

“I feel that we have a fantastic platform,” Lopetegui said, of West Ham. “I think the last few years have been very good years to have this base, of course, but my ambition as a coach is always to be better and better, to achieve more and bigger aims and to encourage and improve the players, the team, and to compete because football is about this – to compete. We are very ambitious about this.

“We came here with the idea and the thought to make a big, big noise. That's why we came here, and we are excited by this challenge. Of course, we are going to do our best to help the club and the team to achieve the best level and to achieve our aims. I assure the fans that they are going to be key in all our achievements.”

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