LONDON (AP) — West Ham signed Lazio striker Valentín “Taty” Castellanos on Monday in a move credited to under pressure coach Nuno Espírito Santo.
In a potential sign of support for Nuno, the statement announcing Castellanos said he had been “identified as a key target by head coach Nuno Espírito Santo.”
In an interview on the club website, Castellanos was also asked about Nuno wanting him in the squad and quoted as saying: “The guys have welcomed me really well, the coach and all.”
Nuno has only been in charge since September and there had been speculation about his future following Saturday's 3-0 loss to previously winless Wolverhampton, which left the team 18th in the Premier League. West Ham next plays Nottingham Forest on Tuesday.
Castellanos joins on a four-and-a-half-year contract with an option for a further year, West Ham said, without confirming the transfer fee.
Castellanos has scored twice in 12 games for Lazio this season after a hamstring injury interrupted his campaign. He's played twice for Argentina and also won the MLS Cup with New York City FC in Major League Soccer. He joined Lazio in 2023 and leaves with 22 goals from 98 games.
This story has been corrected to change the spelling of Castellanos' first name from Valentine to Valentín.
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FILE - Lazio's Taty Castellanos during a Serie A soccer match between Lazio and Hellas Verona, at Rome's Olympic Stadium, Sunday, Aug. 31, 2025. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini, file)
CAIRO (AP) — A council fighting against Yemen’s Houthi rebels said Wednesday it had expelled the leader of a separatist movement and charged him with treason after he reportedly declined to travel to Saudi Arabia for talks.
The statement carried by SABA news agency controlled by anti-Houthi forces is the latest escalation between Saudi-backed forces and the Southern Transitional Council, which had been backed by the United Arab Emirates. It also further complicates the future of Yemen, the Arab world's poorest country riven by one of the Mideast's worst conflicts for over a decade.
The whereabouts of STC leader Aidarous al-Zubaidi were not immediately known.
The statement from SABA accused al-Zubaidi of “damaging the republic’s military, political and economic standing,” as well as “forming an armed gang and committing the murder of officers and soldiers of the armed forces.”
The STC has not commented on the decision of the anti-Houthi leadership group, known as the Presidential Leadership Council. That council formed in April 2022 after President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi of Yemen's internationally recognized government stepped down.
But its members all had competing interests and backers, with their forces never taking the fight to the Houthis even after both the United States and Israel launched massive bombing campaigns targeting the rebels. An uneasy ceasefire between the combatants on the ground in Yemen has held for years.
In late December, tensions began over the STC's advances in the governorates of Hadramout and Mahra, which were once held by Saudi-backed forces.
An earlier statement Wednesday from Maj. Gen, Turki al-Malki, a spokesperson for a Saudi-led coalition in Yemen, said al-Zubaidi, had been due to take a flight to Saudi Arabia but did not take the flight with other council officials.
“The legitimate government and the coalition received intelligence indicating that al-Zubaidi had moved a large force —including armored vehicles, combat vehicles, heavy and light weapons, and ammunition,” al-Malki said. Al-Zubaidi “fled to an unknown location.”
Saudi Arabia in recent weeks has bombed STC positions and struck what is said was a shipment of Emirati weapons. After Saudi pressure and an ultimatum from anti-Houthi forces to withdraw from Yemen, the UAE said Saturday it had withdrawn its forces.
The tensions in Yemen have further strained ties between Saudi Arabia and the UAE, neighbors on the Arabian Peninsula that have competed over economic issues and regional politics.
Ostensibly, Saudi Arabia and the UAE have shared the coalition’s professed goal of fighting against the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels, who have held Yemen's capital, Sanaa, since 2014.
Yemen, on the southern edge of the Arabian Peninsula off East Africa, borders the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. The war there has killed more than 150,000 people, including fighters and civilians, and created one of the world’s worst humanitarian disasters.
The Houthis, meanwhile, have launched attacks on hundreds of ships in the Red Sea corridor over the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip, disrupting regional shipping. The U.S., which earlier praised Saudi-Emirati efforts to end the crisis over the separatists, has launched airstrikes against the rebels under Presidents Joe Biden and Donald Trump.
Associated Press writer Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, contributed to this report.
FILE - The president of the Yemen's Southern Transitional Council Aidarous Al-Zubaidi sits for an interview, Sept. 22, 2023, in New York, while attending the United Nations General Assembly's annual high-level meeting of world leaders. (AP Photo/Ted Shaffrey, File)
