Marko Arnautovic’s former Stoke City team mate Peter Crouch has said that a move to China has always been on the Austrian’s radar.
BBC Sport reported earlier this week that an unnamed Chinese club had made a £35million bid for the 29-year-old, and Crouch has provided the inside scoop on the situation.
“The interest in him from the Chinese Super League, however, does not surprise me,” he wrote in his Daily Mail column. “I remember talking to him about it a couple of years ago when their clubs started buying players such as Oscar and Ramires from Chelsea. China was definitely on his radar.
“His head, though, will definitely have been turned by the amount of money on offer in China. West Ham are adamant that they will not sell him but it seems pretty clear that he wants to go, given what his brother, Danijel, said on Thursday. ”
OPINION
This is an interesting tidbit from Crouch. No one really knew that Arnautovic’s interest in China stretched back such a long way. As Crouch said they discussed the matter a few years back at Stoke so it’s clear that the Austrian international has been thinking about this sort of move for a long time. The money on offer over there is ridiculous, quite frankly, so of course his head is going to be turned to some extent. With the fact that he’s had this in the back of his mind as well, the picture starts to look pretty gloomy for West Ham. He is a fabulous player but, ultimately, if he doesn’t want to be at the club then he needs to be cut loose. The Hammers should get what they can from him and move him on as soon as possible. Clearly, as Crouch says, he wants to go. So it’s best for everyone involved that the club take the boatload of money on offer for the near-thirty-year-old and move on.
