I have to be honest when we signed Arnautovic I wasn't exactly doing cartwheels, whilst I had seen him score some nice goals my opinion was always that he was what I call a 'match of the day' player (a player who scores the odd outrageous goal and makes some good highlights but when you watch ninety minutes of football from him every week its hard work and he really isn't worth the hype).
He started poorly cutting an isolated figure out on the left, he looked disinterested and lazy, a game against Watford sticks out in the memory where he sulked around and seemed to make little effort, fans were not impressed and a lot of us were worried we had signed a turkey.
Say what you want about David Moyes, he pulled a master stroke moving the big Austrian to centre forward. Once up front he looked a completely different player, scoring goals, terrorising defences, antagonising Mark Hughes and playing with the heart and passion the fans demand. Would we have been relegated without the transformation of Arnautovic? Probably not due to there being a number of poor teams in the division but we would have been very, very close. Think the game at home to Chelsea where he came inside and curled into the far corner and we then parked the bus, a seemingly unlikely three points which contributed to our staying in the division.
Since Arnautovic has moved up front he has become our talisman, Chicarito was meant to be our star man up front but with the way West Ham were playing football it was difficult for him to make an impact, we needed a player with stature and guile to physically match the premier league defenders and Arnautovic not only had that but he had the skill and technique to give them all kind of problems. As a supporter you always knew there was a chance of something happening with Arnie up top, a moment of magic, a goal out of nothing.
This season it still feels the same, whilst we have won games without Arnautovic you do feel that the team is considerably weaker, considerably less intimidating to the opposition and does not hold the same threat without him. Yes he sulks, throws his arms in the air and sometimes looks like he's carrying an injury when perhaps he isn't but he is still the man that you would look to when the chips are down. When Brighton went two goals up not so long ago some good substitutions were made but it was Arnautovic that scored the goals to get us back into the game.
Now it looks like he could force a move, and some would say well let him go if he doesn't want to play for West Ham etc etc. Its hard to disagree particularly as like most I feel let down and angry that the player that seemed to love the club and have an affinity with the fans wants to pack his bags for the promises of some far eastern cash. The problem for us is do we feel as happy with out other options up front? I know I don't, Carrol, Perez, Hernandez? Can they bring to the team what Arnautovic does? For me not even close. There are better players than Arnautovic of course but somehow he seems/seemed the perfect fit at West Ham. I honestly don't think a lot of top strikers could slot in as well as Arnie has and lead the line in the same way. We have been linked with some players, the best of which I think is Callum Wilson. Lets face it we know all about him and some could make the case that he is a better centre forward than Arnautovic. Somehow i'd prefer Arnautovic (in our team at least). We are not likely to get Wilson, Chelsea are sniffing around and they would want a huge transfer fee, far more than 35m surely. I think that Arnautovic would be very hard for us to replace even in the summer let along the next three weeks. As I write this we have just come off a favourable run of fixtures and lie 10th in the league after giving the other teams a 4 game headstart. We have injury worries and I feel that without Arnautovic we would do well to beat the 13th we finish last season. Can Pellegrini pull off a bit of Wizadry in the transfer market? The performances of Fabien Balbuena so far this season would suggest that he can but I do feel this is very bad news for us and that we cannot let Arnautovic go in the January Window.
We have made strides forward buy purchasing Anderson, Fabianski, Balbuena and Diop. Snodgrass now looks a decent player and the emergence of Declan Rice as an outstanding defensive midfielder have given us all hope that we can be top six rather than bottom 6. I felt that we were one or two players away from being superior to the likes of Leicester and Everton and for us to have a run at the likes of Arsenal. For me Arnautovic remains our best player and if there is a way to resolve this to keep him at the club and happy or at least until an adequate replacement is found (and as I have argued this will be tough) we should take it.
