Jose Fonte swaps Southampton for West Ham in £8M move

West Ham manager Slaven Bilic will have another veteran option to help his defensive ranks as the club announced Friday the signing of centre-back Jose Fonte from Southampton, penning the Portugal international to a two-and-a-half-year contract for an £8-million fee.

Fonte, winner of Euro 2016 and captain of the Saints since 2014, now joins a backline that has undergone something of a transformation as Bilic has employed a 3-5-2 formation for the 2016-17 Premier League campaign.

His Southampton contract was set to expire in 2018 and he was linked with the likes of Liverpool, Everton, Crystal Palace, and West Brom. But Fonte, who played 288 times with the Saints in eight seasons, ultimately decided to bid farewell to St. Mary's in favour of a move to London.

"I signed for West Ham because they are a great club and a very big club. They have a lot of fans and I have known for a number of years how passionate they are," Fonte said in a club-issued statement.

"The manager was also a very big influence. I thought that he really wanted me and that he sold me the project and the ambition of the club.

"I told the manager in conversations that we want to win and we want to win trophies. The ambition is big and we need to aim high."

Fonte's time at Southampton ended on Friday but he'd already become soured after he had been reduced to a bench role in recent weeks, the result of his transfer request away from the club.

Southampton's director of football Les Reed publicly revealed Fonte did not wish to sign a new contract with the club, but the Portuguese center-back responded by saying he did not reject anything, adding: "In fact, I have been informed by Southampton that they are not offering me a new contract."

Such was the nature of this disagreement that Southampton issued just four quick lines in its club-issued release, bidding its former captain a quick and straightforward farewell perhaps unfitting of his time with the team.

The club wrote: "Southampton Football Club would like to thank Jose for his service and for his contribution to all the club's achievements in his time here. We would also like to wish him well for the future."

Southampton boss Claude Puel will now look to build the relationship between Virgil van Dijk and Maya Yoshida in the middle of his back four, or look to the January market to find an immediate replacement for Fonte.

Meanwhile, Fonte will have to compete to displace one of James Collins, Winston Reid, or Angelo Ogbonna in West Ham's starting XI, competition that could serve the 12th-placed side well as it looks to climb into the top half of the table and leave Southampton, 13th, behind in its wake.