West Ham exclusive: Owner turns down three bids as he holds out for £120million

West Ham's beleaguered Icelandic owners have already had THREE offers to buy them out.

Owner Bjorgolfur Gudmundsson and his associates have dismissed the bids out of hand as they are way short of their £120million valuation.

Any prospective buyers would also have to take on the club's debt, believed to be in the region of around £50million. But the combined total of £170million for West Ham still falls way short of the £400million Newcastle owner Mike Ashley wants to sell up.

Gudmundsson is trying to sell before he is bankrupted by a £30m claim for damages from Sheffield United over the Carlos Tevez affair.

The financier bought the club for £85m two years ago, invested another £30m, and lost £230m in the banking crisis when Icelandic bank Landbankski - in which he has a 45percent controlling share - recently closed.

On the pitch Zola has shrugged off West Ham's awful record of not having won at Anfield since September 1963.

The Italian believes Liverpool are below par at present - following their 1-0 Champions League win over Marseille last week - and the Hammers are boosted by Fernando Torres's absence through injury.

Zola said: "I don't think Liverpool are at their best moment, but we are focused, we know we cannot make any mistakes because they will be there for the taking.

"We have seen them a lot and we want to play the match as good as we can, so we'll see what is going to happen. I think my team is going to play this match at the best moment because they are coming from two results and the team is confident."

Indeed, after a run of 24 games without a clean sheet, West Ham held Bolton to a goalless draw then saw off Sunderland 1-0 at the Stadium of Light last week.

Zola added: "We are going to play our own match, the way we normally play. We're not a team who can got there and sit back and wait and wait, we have different qualities.

"The defensive side is going to be vital because when you play a team who are better than you. You have to look after more the defensive aspect of the game, which is what we have been focusing on this week.

"But we're not going to sit back and wait for something to happen, we try to make the story of the game for us."

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