West Ham United target Oleksandr Zinchenko gave David Moyes plenty of reasons to walk away from a potential deal for the Manchester City left-back, by producing a shaky display in Wednesday night’s Carabao Cup semi-final win over rivals Manchester United.

Pep Guardiola kept the 24-year-old in his starting line-up for the midweek meeting at Old Trafford, having recalled Zinchenko for Sunday’s win at Chelsea after more than two months out of the Sky Blues’ Premier League side.

Reliable insider ExWHUemployee revealed last month that Zinchenko was a potential target for the London Stadium outfit in the January transfer window after Moyes lost Arthur Masuaku for the foreseeable following knee surgery, while reports claimed Guardiola is open to offers.

Man City were believed to be prepared to listen to bids for Zinchenko this month after initially falling out of favour at the Etihad Stadium, with Southampton and Leicester City also keen to monitor the former Wolverhampton Wanderers target’s situation.

Zinchenko now appears to be back in Guardiola’s good backs after two successive starts across all competitions for the first time since October, yet was far from the star of the show as the Citizens secured their place in the Carabao Cup final.

The £18m-rated left-back endured more than his fair share of shaky moments up against Marcus Rashford, Scott McTominay and Aaron Wan-Bissaka, with Zinchenko often lacking the physical presence needed to contain Manchester United’s right-sided options.

He struggled to contain Anthony Martial at set-pieces, too, but produced a bright moment in the 24th-minute to feed Phil Foden through to score, only to see the strike ruled out for offside.

All in all, Zinchenko ended the night with success in just one of his eight combined duels for a measly success rate of 12%, having lost each of his three battles on the ground and four of his five aerial contests, per SofaScore.

He additionally lost possession 12 times, failed to complete his only attempted dribble, made no successful tackles, was dribbled past twice, recorded no clearances or blocked shots and registered just one interception.

The defender was often safe in possession with 79 completed passes from 89 attempts having seen the ball frequently for 102 touches, but struggled to offer any real accuracy at range with six of his nine long balls failing to find a teammate.

Zinczenko’s performance will have offered Moyes plenty of reasons why West Ham should walk away from any interest in the Ukraine international, should the former Manchester United boss look to acquire a new left-back to replace Masuaku.

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