Slaven Bilic reveals Andy Carroll suffered whiplash after his spectacular scissor kick goal for West Ham
Carroll is a doubt for the Hammers' visit to Middlesbrough on Saturday
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Your support makes all the difference.Andy Carroll is a slight doubt for West Ham's trip to Middlesbrough - with a whiplash injury.
The striker scored with a spectacular, acrobatic scissor kick during last week's 3-0 win over Crystal Palace.
But at the end of the match he was feeling a problem with his neck and had to sit out training earlier this week.
Manager Slaven Bilic was surprised by the unusual diagnosis, but still expects his big frontman to be fit for the trip to Teesside.
"He's got a whiplash injury, that's what I was told from the physios," Bilic told a press conference on Thursday.
"Then I went to the dictionary basically to find out what that is. It was a sore neck, but hopefully he will be okay. It was at the end of the game, I don't know how he got it. He then trained Tuesday very hard, he was brilliant in training, but then reported some neck pain. But as I say, hopefully he will be okay."
Meanwhile, Dimitri Payet remains in limbo at West Ham but Bilic is hopeful of making a new signing within the next 24 hours.
The wantaway France midfielder is still training with the under-23 squad while the Hammers hierarchy haggle with Marseille, the club he wants to rejoin for personal reasons.
The east Londoners are taking a tough stance after Payet refused to play against Palace and have already knocked back two bids.
Bilic insisted last week that the 29-year-old, West Ham's star player last season, would not be sold.
But with the end of the January transfer window looming Bilic has now told Marseille to pay the asking price if they want to land their man.
"Is his departure inevitable? I don't know," said Bilic. "What has changed? Nothing. Dimi took his stance clearly. We took our stance very clearly and it stays the same. We are not going to sell our best players on the cheap just because someone wants to sign them or even because they want to go home.
"I left it with the chairman and I'm sure he's going to do the best thing. The ball is in Marseille's court. They are the ones who expressed interest. Now they should act.
"I don't talk about numbers. All I'm saying is we were very firm, we know the market, we know how good or great he is as a player. Like everybody he has his price."
PA
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