Slaven Bilic: Middlesbrough's offer for Ashley Fletcher was too good to turn down

'Proud' | Slaven Bilic says Ashley Fletcher (pictured) received a fantastic offer from Boro
West Ham United via Getty Images
Vaishali Bhardwaj27 July 2017

Slaven Bilic has admitted West Ham couldn't turn down Middlesbrough's "fantastic" offer for West Ham striker Ashley Fletcher.

As reported by Standard Sport on Thursday, Fletcher was given permission to leave the Hammers' training camp in Germany to fly back to England and undergo a medical at Boro ahead of completing a £7million move to the Championship side.

Fletcher only joined West Ham last summer after his contract at Manchester United, where he spent six years coming up through the ranks, expired.

But after the club signed striker Javier Hernandez from Bayer Leverkusen and Marko Arnautovic from Stoke, Fletcher fell down the pecking order.

Bilic, who played a key role in bringing the forward to the club last summer, admitted that despite the new arrivals he wanted Fletcher to stay at West Ham - but conceded Boro's offer was too good to turn down both for the Hammers and the player himself.

"He got a fantastic offer last night," Bilic told a press conference on Thursday.

"Ideally I wanted to have a different scenario but the offer was so good and I told him to be proud."

Fletcher is now expected to discuss personal terms with Garry Monk's side before completing a move to Boro within the next few days.

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