Fulham boss Roy Hodgson has revealed the club pulled out of a £4 million deal to sign former Wigan Athletic striker Marlon King when they discovered he had served a prison sentence.

King was punished with an 18-month sentence for groping a student in a nightclub and then breaking her nose when she spurned his advances.

His projected move to Craven Cottage from Watford in January 2008 collapsed at the 11th hour, ostensibly over a discrepancy with his medical.

However, reflecting on the aborted move for the Jamaican international, Hodgson admitted to The Mirror: “I think we got lucky in that we didn’t sign him.

“I had only just come to the club and I didn’t know the player. All I knew about him was his goalscoring record and the information I was able to gather, which was not sufficiently detailed.

“There was a problem with the medical and it also became a problem when we found out he had a jail sentence. Our owner Mr Al Fayed was not at all keen on that so the transfer was allowed to collapse and he went to Wigan instead.”

The Cottagers boss also reserved an icy blast for the players agent Tony Finnigan, who was bullish about his client’s chances of finding a new club.

Finnigan is insistent his client will be able to find another club but Hodgson warned Fulham would never dream of reviving their interest in the disgraced player.

He added: “Marlon’s agent is fairly clear on the subject and he has a very cynical view. He believes there is no moral judgement in football and the fact the person we’re talking about will score goals will blot any moral values people have.

“I don’t know if that’s true, but I do know he won’t be signed by Fulham. The owner of our club would not embrace that type of signing and I as a manager would not embrace it, either.”