Kalvin Phillips to West Ham is a major coup for David Moyes at just the right time

Among the raft of wholesome YouTube content produced by England in the Gareth Southgate era, a rather joyous clip of Declan Rice presenting Kalvin Phillips with the national team’s Player of the Year award sticks in the mind.

“40,000 votes?” Phillips repeats, slightly stunned, as Rice surprises him with a BT-sponsored gold brick, recognition from England fans for a superb Euro 2020 campaign.

Had the proud Scotsman in David Moyes not prevented him from engaging in any such poll, it would surely have been 40,001.

Moyes had the Rice-Phillips partnership in mind when he made a club-record £50million bid to sign the latter from Leeds in January 2022, though his admiration by then was long-lived, the midfielder already on his radar by the time he returned for a second stint as West Ham boss late in 2019.

It has taken more than four years, a complete midfield revamp, the £105m sale of Rice and, for Phillips, a marked career downturn, but at last, Moyes has his man.

The 28-year-old on Friday completed his switch from Manchester City on loan until the end of the season. It had been expected that the deal would include an option-to-buy, but that has been shelved for now after the clubs failed to agree terms.

The summer is, first and foremost, what has made this deal happen now. Having started just two League games in 18 months at the Etihad and played little more than five hours of first-team football this term, both Phillips and Southgate had been clear about the need for something to change in the run up to the Euros in Germany.

For West Ham it looks a major coup — and a timely one at that.

Moyes has settled on a midfield three of Edson Alvarez, Tomas Soucek and James Ward-Prowse this season, but has virtually no specialist cover, and his team’s over-reliance is starting to tell. Ward-Prowse’s form has dipped for the first time since his summer arrival from Southampton, while Alvarez has missed the last two matches with a calf problem.

Since his debut, the Mexican has sat out three League matches and West Ham have not won any of them.

Phillips will compete with all three, capable of playing either at the base of midfield in a single or double pivot, or on the right of a three. There is the prospect, too, that a partnership with Alvarez may be secure enough to allow Lucas Paqueta to return to No10.

How much Moyes can expect from his new signing and how quickly is a fair question, given how little football he has played in the last year-and-a-half, but Southgate has not hesitated in starting Phillips in England’s two most important matches this season, against Italy home and away, and his performances in both repaid that faith.

At club level, Phillips’s few appearances for City have taught us little, most coming either as part of second-string sides in cup competitions or off the bench in routine League wins.

We know, though, that the player who left Leeds was an exceptional one — and for all the 18 months since under Pep Guardiola have not gone the way Phillips would have hoped, they have still been time spent under the all-conquering Catalan.

The story of Phillips’s City redundancy is a curious one and, since the issue has always appeared one of compatibility rather than quality, represents a rare errant shot from a recruitment team that seldom misses.

Certainly, there have been no accusations of an attitude problem, the sole controversy coming when Guardiola unhelpfully referred to Phillips as “overweight”.

Still, there must be an element of confidence that needs rebuilding if a fine player is to be truly revived — and the way Moyes briefly put Jesse Lingard’s career back on track during a similar half-season spell bodes well on that front.

Having sought Phillips for so long, how he must already hope this turns into something more permanent.