Moyes demands more from summer signing despite recent good form

Moyes demands more from summer signing despite recent good form

West Ham manager David Moyes says he still “needs more” from summer signing Marko Arnautovic despite his recent good form.

The Austrian – who joined the Hammers as a club record signing from Stoke City during the summer – has been phenomenal in recent weeks, and is now the club’s top scorer this season with six goals and three assists in his last seven top flight games.

Despite his good form however, Moyes says he wants more from the £24 million man as he looks to continue to propel West Ham up the table.

“Everybody knows he looks, at times, a moody boy, but I’ve actually found him really good. I’ve actually found him quite funny, but we’re keeping him on a short leash!” the manager said following the weekend’s 4-1 win over Huddersfield in which Arnautovic again got on the score sheet.



“He’s not as challenging as it gets, because he is actually someone who knows the right things and I’ve got to say he’s been really good since we’ve been in. He’s trained well, he’s tried to improve and everything we’ve asked him to do, he’s come up to it.

“More important, he’s shown everyone that where the question was, that he wasn’t running about or putting in any effort, that would be the last thing you’d say about him now. What we’re not going to do is allow him to go back to where he was, to go back to that any more. That’s the challenge for him.”

“Now, we’re saying that we’re keeping it up. You have to remember he missed the Tottenham game with an injury and he didn’t play against Shrewsbury, so we got him back fresh, but I’m still working to get him through 90 minutes at that level, at that speed.

“He’s doing maybe 70 minutes in games and I’m saying ‘I need more from you’, but maybe I can’t get that all into him straight away. What he is giving us is a great level of speed and energy in the early part of the game.”

West Ham take on Shrewsbury in their FA Cup third round replay at the London Stadium on Tuesday night.