West Ham’s £20m bid for Premier League forward rejected

Stoke have rejected an improved £20m offer from rivals West Ham for wantaway forward Marko Arnautovic, reports The Daily Telegraph.

The Austria international wants to leave Stoke this summer and submitted a transfer request in the wake of West Ham’s failed £15m offer earlier this week.

Stoke are currently waiting to discover the extent of the knee injury Arnautovic suffered in a pre-season game this week, but it will still take a significant fee for the Hammers to prize him away this summer.

Arnautovic still has three years left to run on his £75,000-a-week contract but has been earmarked as a priority signing by West Ham manager Slaven Bilic, who is keen to add more new faces to his squad ahead of the coming season.

The 28-year-old has finished each of his four Premier League campaigns top for chances created for Stoke (190 in total) and has also scored more league goals than any other team-mate since August 2015 (17).

For more stats on Marko Arnautovic, click here to visit his WhoScored player page