The 2017 African Cup of Nations is coming up and West Ham could have three players featuring during the three week long tournament in Gabon.
The Hammers could lose both Cheikhou Kouyate and Diafra Sakho to one-time runners-up Senegal, whilst record-signing Andre Ayew could make the trip to represent four-time champions Ghana and Sofiane Feghouli to Algeria.
It's likely that Kouyate will be the biggest loss for manager Slaven Bilic after the former Anderlecht midfielder has stepped into the West Ham defence this season as cover and made the position his own, but should definitely be on the plane to Gabon as Senegal's national team captain.
Kouyate could find himself again lining up in the midfield with former Hammer Mohamed Diame, who was selected in the most recent Senegal squad for the 2018 FIFA World Cup qualifier against South Africa.
Also expected to be called-up by Senegal head coach Aliou Cisse is striker Sakho, who isn't expected to be fit from his current hamstring injury until the 14th January – just one day before Senegal kick-off their campaign with a Group B clash with Tunisia at the Stade de Franceville in Franceville.
That means that Cisse would have to select Sakho still injured if he wanted to gamble that he'd be fit for the tournament – a decision that isn't likely to please Bilic.
The third player that Bilic could be without is his summer £20m striker Ayew, who is the current vice-captain for Ghana behind former Sunderland star Asamoah Gyan.
Ghana start their 2017 tournament with a Group D fixture against Uganda on 17th January at the Stade de Port-Gentil in Port-Gentil and will most-likely have Ayew leading the line alongside his younger brother Jordan – currently playing at Aston Villa in the EFL Championship.
Interestingly, Ayew's younger brother has just one international goal less than his older Premier League brother despite making 29 appearances less on the international stage.
Finally, based on their most-recent squad, Feghouli is the fourth-highest appearance maker for Algeria and will most probably get the nod for another international tournament. Feghouli joined Bilic's Hammers in the summer on a free transfer and scored on his competitive debut against NK Domzale at the London Stadium's historic first ever match.
He struggled with injury immediately after that game though and has continuously found himself placed on the bench with game time extremely rare.
With Feghouli possibly a candidate to go out on loan during the January transfer window, its unlikely Bilic will be too concerned about losing him to the African Cup of Nations for three weeks.
West Ham are actually quite unlucky though when you compare their number of African players to the rest of the Premier League as they'll potentially be losing four players to the Cup of Nations whereas other clubs like Burnley, Chelsea, Swansea and Tottenham have no players expected to head to the tournament.