Slaven Bilic has revealed Andy Carroll could be shown the exit door at the London Stadium unless his fitness improves.
The Englishman has had an extremely injury prone career in East London with the Hammers, and only recently returned to action following a near 6 month spell on the sidelines, causing him to miss all of pre-season and the start of the new campaign.
It appears patience with the striker’s injury woes is wearing thin however, after the Croatian has insisted Carroll must improve his fitness in order to earn a new contract with West Ham.
“This is his season to be fit, to stay fit.” said Bilic speaking in The Sun.
“He’s got two years (on his current contract). If we are talking about his contract, the question mark about him is his fitness, how much he is available during the season.
“We are doing things a little bit different in terms of we are not pushing him as soon as he was back.
“I remember two seasons ago or even last season that they told us it was always the case in his career, after a couple of sessions rolling up the sleeves and roll inside and 100 mph straight away.
“We have done a little bit different now. We are trying to maintain and improve his fitness by managing him not with a caution but not also to rush him straight away if we need him.”
As well as improving his fitness, Bilic has said that he too must do so his form, stating the self proclaimed ‘king’ of the London Stadium has healthy competition for a place in the starting line-up from the club’s other two strikers.
Bilic added: “He is not one that slows down because he feels he is the king. He’s got competition now. He had competition last year on paper but Diafra Sakho was injured.
“Now we have Chicharito because we didn’t want to stay just on Andy, knowing what happened in the last couple of seasons. It is good to have competition.”
Carroll had a disappointing game at the weekend in the 3-2 loss to Tottenham, but will be looking to bounce back this coming weekend when the Hammers welcome Swansea to the London Stadium.
