Report: West Ham Director Doesn't Want African Players Because They "Cause Mayhem" 

After being confronted with leaked emails in which he advocated against signing a Senegalese player, West Ham’s director of player recruitment Tony Henry admitted to the Daily Mail that the club does not want to sign any more African players.

The Mail obtained a Jan. 27 email from Henry in which he wrote, “We don’t want any more Africans.” After initially denying that the club had a policy against signing African players, he told the Mail that West Ham no longer wanted to sign them after the transfer saga that ended with Diafra Sakho leaving the club.

Henry said he’s not racist or anything, he just thinks they cause mayhem:

“Because we had three and we felt we didn’t particularly want any more African players.”

Asked why, Henry replied: “Erm, no reason. It’s nothing racist at all. It’s just sometimes they can have a bad attitude.”

‘We had problems with Sakho, with Diafra Sakho. We find that when they are not in the team they cause mayhem. It’s nothing against the African race at all.”

Asked if he thought his view was discriminatory towards African players, Henry asked: “In what way?”

West Ham have African players on the team currently, including Senegalese midfielder Cheikhou Kouyaté and Nigerian-Italian defender Angelo Ogbonna. The club sold Sakho and Ghanaian forward Andre Ayew during the January window. Henry clarified that the club was an equal opportunity club despite not wanting to sign African players, but in his words, “If you’ve got too many, they all sit together and it becomes a situation where you can have problems.” That settles it, then.

[ Daily Mail]