By Paul Konchesky’s own admission – and this is long before the age of Fabrizio Romano, remember – much of the West Ham United squad were left rather nonplussed when Carlos Tevez and Javier Mascherano arrived out of the blue.
In a double deal that felt pretty remarkable at the time, and now appears even more so with all the context included, the Hammers pulled off a staggering double deal for two of the brightest talents in South American football.
Carlos Tevez and Javier Mascherano, both of whom were representing Corinthians in Brazil before moving to Upton Park, had caught the eye at the Germany World Cup only a few weeks earlier. Not only that, the duo were frequently linked with moves to the bonafide elite of European football.
West Ham United, then, was hardly a destination anyone had in mind at the beginning of that summer window.
The Argentinian duo would, of course, leave very different legacies in East London. Former Hammers left-back Paul Konchesky remembers Mascherano fondly on the training pitch but, when it came to actual first-team minutes, they proved few and far between.
As for a certain centre-forward, former captain Mark Noble accepts that Tevez saved West Ham from relegation almost single-handedly before moving on to Manchester United. He burned brief, yet, but extremely bright.
Paul Koncheskey recalls Javier Mascherano and Carlos Tevez at West Ham United
Speaking on the Under the Cosh podcast, Konchesky was frozen out by Alan Curbishley by the time Tevez hit his stride during the second-half of the 2006/07 season.
He remembers the former Man City and Juventus icon fondly, even if Konchesky knew from the start that both Tevez and Mascherano had been rather thrust upon an unsuspecting Alan Pardew, the man in the dugout before Curbishley took his place in December of that year.
“I was over the moon because they were my team, my club. Lads I was with for such a long time. I trained with them every day, it’s just I didn’t travel. But they were my mates, really close mates. For them to get out of it and for Tevez to do what he did, it was fantastic for me.
“It was interesting [when Tevez and Mascherano arrived]. We trained probably on a Tuesday and the manager didn’t take the session. We were like, ‘Where’s the manager?’ Then Pards came walking onto the training pitch with these two fellas.
“‘Who are these?’ The lads were like, they’re two signings! The manager called us in, you could see from his face they weren’t his signings. They came from above or whatever. He obviously introduced us and the lads we were like, ‘I told you’.”
Mascherano left the Hammers for Liverpool and then Barcelona
Mascherano bizarrely started only five Premier League matches before joining Liverpool halfway through that season. While Hayden Mullins and Nigel Reo-Coker were fine operators at their peak, it’s fair to say neither would enjoy the same success as their former team-mate, specifically in Barcelona colours.
“Mascherano never played! He never, ever played. I remember Christian Dailly tried to tackle him, and he put his foot on the ball, rolled it through his legs and got out the other side. The things he could do. But he didn’t play.
“Hayden Mullins and Nigel played [instead]. I think he went and played in a reserve game at Bishop Stortford, under the lights, a 7pm kick-off one day.
“Nige was the captain and, to be fair, Hayden was really steady and he did really well. But [Mascherano] goes on to play for Liverpool and Barcelona, and he couldn’t get in our team! Unbelievable.”
Roy Carroll on the wrong end of a Carlos Tevez outburst
As for Tevez, one of Koncheskey’s fondest memories – alongside the goals, of course – was the time goalkeeper Roy Carroll discovered that his grasp of English was maybe a little better than he was letting on.
“Tevez, he was magical. He wasn’t interested in speaking English, didn’t want to go for lessons, whereas Mascherano really, really tried.
“I remember on a Friday before a game, Roy Carroll was on at Tevez. And he turned round to Roy Carroll and said ‘**** ***’ in English. He didn’t speak English again! That was the only English he ever spoke. He didn’t speak, and then turned around and swore at him!”
“They stuck together to be fair to them, and as much as they could keep away from the training ground or from the lads, they did. They were their own people and did stuff with themselves and their own family really.”
