West Ham United are ramping up their pursuit of strikers if media reports are to be believed.
Hammers boss Slaven Bilic wants two strikers after growing fed up of relying on injury-prone duo Andy Carroll and Diafra Sakho.
The likes of Kelechi Iheanacho, Michy Batshuayi and Olivier Giroud have been heavily linked with the East Londoners so far this summer.
Defender Pablo Zabaleta is currently West Ham’s only arrival of the summer so far.
West Ham United manager Slaven Bilic
But if media reports are accurate that could change soon after the East Londoners were said to have bid for Cologne’s Anthony Modeste, Villareal’s Cedric Bakumbu and Bayer Leverkusen’s Javier Hernandez.
Over the weekend Sky Sports claimed the Hammers were in talks to sign French former Blackburn Rovers striker Modeste.
Things have gone quiet since with speculation the club has set its sights elsewhere.
And could that be because the fee quoted by Cologne proved galling for owners David Sullivan and David Gold, who could have signed Modeste for just £6 million last summer – as reported by Sky Sports.
According to Sky Sports, the 29-year-old was actually offered to West Ham but the club elected to continue their ultimately fruitless chase of a marquee striker signing with much-publicised pursuits of Carlos Bacca, Batshuayi and Alexandre Lacazette failing.
Modeste challenges Bayern star Vidal
Modeste scored 15 goals in his first season at Cologne when he was supposedly valued at £6 million. One year later and an extra 10 goals and his price has risen six-fold.
At 29 – and given his unsuccessful time with Blackburn where he failed to score in nine appearances and was sent off – it would be a big gamble for the Hammers and could see them pursue other targets.
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