Dimitri Payet has completed his £25 million return to former club Marseille after forcing his way out of West Ham United.
The French international, who was one of the best players in the Premier League last season has signed a four-and-a-half year deal with Marseille with the option of a further year.
The way that Payet, the one superstar in the West Ham line-up forced his way out of the club did not go down well with Hammers joint-chairman David Sullivan who prefers to be the one doing the bullying instead of being bullied into a decision.
‘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.
‘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.’
Payet wanted out of London so badly that he took a £25,000 a-week pay cut in order to return to France.
To replace their talisman in the line-up West Ham have signed Robert Snodgrass from Hull and remain in talks over Scott Hogan at Brentford.
