CRYSTAL PALACE 0-2 WEST HAM | WHY DO SOME FANS DISLIKE TOMAS SOUCEK? | POST MATCH REFLECTIONS

[Applause] a very good afternoon to you or good evening or early evening to you uh welcome to the West Ham voice on a Sunday afternoon I hope you're all well and I hope you're enjoying the long weekend and uh it started pretty well didn't it for us uh West Ham fans with the two-nil win away against uh Crystal Palace at a ground over the last few years that hasn't been very favorable for us so to Come Away with a two-nil win and a really good performance was fantastic um how many of you um remember me sitting here last week saying that um when I did my reflection on the Aston Villa Game saying that if we start the same1 against Crystal Palace will get beat and I also said if we uh don't have any pace in our team you know thinking about someone like Chris Eno Somerville coming in will get beat well this is why I do podcasts and YouTube channels rather than being a manager or a head coach of a Premier League team what do I know look if you're new to the Channel please do hit the like button which is down there somewhere please also become a subscriber of the channel uh if you like the content um nothing it doesn't cost anything to to subscribe content is always free so if you like the content please like and please subscribe so imagine my shock and everybody else's shock when we got the team news and lo and behold the same lineup was announced to that of Aston Villa and um we kind of scratched our heads a little bit and we started to think oh here we go um another man another manager or head coach that's a little bit like uh David Moyes uh doesn't listen to anyone and well like I said why should he because the performance that we put in this time round was a lot more assured an an awful lot more better than it was against Aston Villa um in the first week of the uh Premier League look uh we kind of rode our luck a little bit in the first half to be honest with you Crystal Palace through eay uh hit the bar hit the post as well uh and um had a one or two good saves from arola who kind of was more assured in goal now that he's climatizing to his new defense that he has in front of him well kilman let's say um so Ariola sort of kept us in it in the first half but uh with regards to uh sual look we love him we know he plays with his heart on his sleeve you know he's a Trier he's always put every uh ounce of effort in when he plays for West Ham but we kind of know that with the greatest of expect to him that he should be more of a backup now than as a starter in the first 11 uh but having said that you know um you know he he helped to keep a clean sheet in the first half of that uh game against Crystal Palace and then mavropanos Doos mavropanos once he cuts out all his little Wayward passes every now and again which he did again in the first half he's actually getting in better and better he's improving he had another assured game and I think that's gotten lot to do with having someone like Maximillian kilman alongside him I think he had his work cut out for him last season maos having to um help uh Kurt Zuma uh with Zuma's lack of pace Etc now he's got a player who's really composed standing next to him you know you could see the way that kilman is playing the game and I think that gives mavropanos confidence and I think MAV Ranos is improving his game because of it um kilman he's uh you know all the all the people that were moaning and complaining uh that we spent too much money 440 million pound is beginning to demonstrate how good a center back he is and that killer pass to Jared boen for our second goal was absolutely superb the way he took it out of Defense took it Forward looked up and saw Bowen's run superb and then in the middle of the park um Rodriguez is getting acclimatized to the Premier League and I think think he had a much better game than he did against Aston Villa one may argue that maybe he didn't have the same kind of press as Aston Villa put on him last week and that's possible I kind of expected a lot more from Crystal Palace to be quite honest with you but um what he did Rodriguez in the center of the park he did well and he did it quite assuredly and composed um uh paketa is H getting back to his match Fitness you could see nice little touches here and there improving just like Jared Bowen as well uh he was uh beginning to demonstrate that he's getting back to match Fitness too I'm going to come on to soek in a minute still a little bit concerned with kudas playing out left but it almost doesn't matter where you put him um you know doesn't you know left side right side in the middle whatever you could see his his uh the input that he has the ball sticks to his feet and uh he was really really good as well and then up front you had Antonio a little bit like sual I don't want to pick players out I think it's a shame to do that but sual and Antonio you are now beginning to see when you have alternatives to to um uh sort of uh compare you are beginning to see the sort of that the certain areas that they're both lacking and look again just like sufal great Endeavor from Antonio he puts blood and guts in every time he plays but he doesn't have the technical skill the ability to sort of carry it to the next level um then we had the subs on 62 minutes it's great that lopi brought Subs on a lot quicker than he did against Aston Villa last week and he made two changes Waker at right back and F Krug at um up front and wanis Saka made an immediate impression didn't he the minute he came on uh he had an instant impact getting the ball five minutes into him being on the pitch he got the ball won it took it down the line gave it to boen B drove it into the center there was a bit of a melee and it fell to such who scored our first goal and uh but what wasn't really good about Waka is he was overlapping looking for that ball again on the right side now it's interesting how many people keep saying that waka's not great going forward I don't know he looked all right to me to be quite honest with you and uh fair play to him as well that he didn't celebrate that goal well he didn't celebrate either goal uh which would have been a dis you know a bit discourteous to old Team Crystal Palace but he made an immediate impact and so did folr to be honest with you folr in the way that he played his game his movement you know positional movement he knows where to move he knows he's got that instinctive Striker approach that he knows where to go how to get look for the ball it's such a shame when the ball fell to him that he didn't put that goal uh that chance away that would have been fantastic uh but we've got a new song for him can't sing it because it's a little bit rude but you could see he appreciates it and I think he will become a bit iconic at West Ham United to be honest with you and then of course on the um 78th minute we had El mashin come back which was good to see as well he replaced Thomas soek in the middle of the park and then you could start seeing the pivot that I've been talking about with him and Rodriguez uh the central Midfield pivot and it was good I think I was a little bit surprised I thought maybe he would probably wouldn't be back until Bournemouth or maybe even next week against Man City but it's great for him to get a few minutes in in this game which is going to bode well and I think that um we now are seeing the depth that we've got in the squad and um it was good to have him back uh he looked fit he looked Lively and uh it gives us another dimension in the center of the park now um we closed off by the way the game you know we we put Debo on uh and also Creswell on to just close the game off and uh it finished 2N and it was a good performance and we it was a deserved win we had a really really good composed away performance uh uh in in this game against Palace who stuffed US 52 let's not forget last season and we've had like a couple of um uh unfortunate um defeats against them at their ground over the years now we got to talk about one player and we got to ask ourselves why is it that some fans regardless of what he does Thomas uh they just seem to have it in for Thomas soek they just don't respect the player uh and what he's given to West Ham let's reflect on soek and the time and since he's been here he's been with us for four and a half years now joined us on Loan in January 2020 when we're under threat of relegation when David Moyes came back in again uh the same time that we got Jared Bowen as J Jared Bowen as well we got him on loan for four four and a half million euros he was made permanent in July 2021 for another 16 million euros um his current value is kind of holding its own about 25 million 29 years of age he's made 209 appearances for West Ham so far 33 goals 11 assists that's not bad by any standard at all you know but yet yet some fans the minute uh we you know we talk about bringing players in like cair Etc immediately people say well yeah that's because we're gonna get rid of soek I don't think I don't think we're gonna get rid of Thomas soek I think if there were possibly could be one other player um that I'm going to talk about in a minute when I give you a quick update on transfers there could be one other player that's GNA likely to be going before him because if you look at the lineup if you look at the Players uh that were selected um we know Zoom is gone we know a gird is likely to be gone by the end of uh this coming week uh quite possibly corn as well we don't know what's happening to Irving but you look on the on the bench uh the nine players that were selected if cair comes in who immediately uh go what who's who which player do you sort of look at to think well who's going to be replacing um who's who is cair going to be replacing the on You could argue it could be Danny in yeah but if we get another Striker then maybe in will be on the other side the players not selected anyway but then you look at Ward prous and you start thinking to yourself is C coming in not as a replacement for Thomas soek but as a replacement for someone like James Ward prous let's let's compare um so's performance uh last season this is based only on the Premier League and I've done it comparing uh Lucas petta and James W prous now ironically James W prous has the better stats all around in terms of things like uh uh uh pass attempts uh pass accuracy uh ground duel success possession lost Etc he comes out a lot better than everyone else now if you compare Thomas soek to Lucas petta it's soek that comes out on top on most things in the Premier League last season soek scored scored seven goals petta scored four of which two were penalties uh when it comes to pass attempts not as many as petta but pass accuracy is better than petta aerial duw success I guess you'd expect because of his high would be better but possession lost is also better than pettas Thomas soek has the better stats when you compare him to someone like petta so why is it well the only thing I can really think of is apart from you know people going on about his technical or lack of technical ability which we know he does have a lack of technical ability uh when you compare him to someone like petta but I think he's a reminder of David Moyes and this is why people seem to have it in for him because if you remember every time uh you know when when Moyes made the selection one of the first players on the team Sheet was always so regardless of his form in the previous game or previous Games Etc soek would rarely ever get dropped and um you kind of start think you used to think to yourself what does it take to drop soek but soek for his lack of technical ability is a disruptor you know he comes on the pitch he offers you something different it's not all about just lobbing the ball up in the air and you know hoping he's going to head it on Etc there's other things that he disrupts midfields he disrupts uh uh defensive backlines Etc and he he's that sort of player that is niggly he's horrible to play against um and um that is why I think David Moyes what Moyes saw in him and this is possibly what latei is seeing in him as well because they can see something that he offers that's different to other players now with cair coming in do I think he's going to be a regular starter I really don't know I think what um L is going to do I think he's going to surprise us I think p is going to start mixing and matching players uh for different games for example the game coming up against Man City next weekend you might see maybe so dropping to the bench quite possibly and you might see the pivot of the two uh Central defensive midfielders of Alvarez and Rodriguez with possibly boen petta and cus uh either all behind uh F crook or you might see maybe soek thrown in there alongside I don't know Alvarez and Rodriguez dropped to the bench or you may see some of you coming in to add Pace with kudus being in the middle and so on what lat is going to start doing is he is going to start mixing it accordingly I don't think we're gonna all right we saw two teams the same in the first game of first two games of the season but I think we're going to start seeing a few surprises not unpleasant surprises but interesting changes L has already suggested that there's more one more than one way to play football there's more than one way to have a formation you can have a 433 4231 uh you know 4141 whatever it may be it's going to be different according to who we're going to play against now that's refreshing in itself um and that's why when cair comes in I think there's going to be a focus on another player now let me go very briefly through uh now before I do that we've got another game before um uh Man City uh next weekend because what we got the midweek carabal Cup against Bournemouth I think we're going to see quite a few different players in that obviously change goalkeeper I think uh fabians is going to be in goal I think Wanaka will start in order to give him much more uh match Fitness much more game time I think toddy B will play alongside him a GD I've put in there but I got a massive question mark over him because he might be gone by then uh I think we're still looking to sell him so question Mark there maybe kilman will play alongside toddo got Creswell out on the left maybe James will prow if he doesn't go I've got him alongside Alvarez who I think Alvarez a bit like Juan Baka will start to give him a bit more match Fitness as well as toddo a bit more match Fitness now I'd love to think that I've got uh that we'll have we'll see Gile and Andy Irving in this lineup but I'm not so sure to be quite honest with you I think maybe uh they players that might be on the bench and may come on but it'd be great to see that happening Somerville I think we be giving a bit of game time and I think VR will come in as well so you can see the reason why LGI wants so many players in the squad is so that he can mix and match because you go back to the man city game and you'll see a completely different lineup so it's going to be interesting to see what happens now with regards to players coming in and going Etc and we know Kurt Zuma is not going to be you know not been selected not on the bench or anything like that you know they still uh hope to see him off to the UAE or or somewhere else a gird is also being touted out there as well so we may see both these players leaving before the end of the transfer window and then of course we got we're linked to Nelson uh from Galatasaray and we're still linked to Trevor chela from Chelsea as well so watch out for that it's going to be one in one out Simply as that now I talked about Midfield and I think apart from the obvious of Max W cor and quite possibly Andy Irving either being sold or maybe going out on loan I think we might see James W prous leaving before the end of this transfer window and I think that's who cair will replace I cannot see it being Thomas soek so M hedging my bets here and thinking that we might see a last minute movement of of um uh James W prous he was on the bench he didn't even get on the pitch uh at the weekends against Crystal Palace um as I've shown you we had different Subs come on but James Ward prow was not used at all so I am just wondering whether we will see James W prous with us by the end of this week and then up front of course there's still talk about bringing in another Striker I genuinely don't know if it's AB because we keep being told yeah despite all the rumors that we don't have an interest in the player but that would mean that one of two Strikers are likely to leave maybe both um if I had my money on one it's more likely to be Antonio than Danny in not because I think Danny in is any better than Antonio but I think in terms of who we might be able to cash in on a player that we could sell more easily at this moment in time it's likely to be Antonio over Danny in so there's a bit more to go so just just uh backtrack great performance good uh substitutions uh impact Subs that made an impact what a difference that makes we're going to see LGI making loads of changes I'm no longer gonna predict well I have done but I I'm never sure now as to what our first 11's going to be because I think lakei is going to do what he says he's going to make use of his whole Squad this is a squad game we're going to start seeing quite a lot of changes I'm not suggesting maybe boen will be dropped or cus would be dropped or anything like that you might start seeing petta on the bench every now and again you might start seeing a false number nine with kudus in the middle um and uh no Strikers part you know Strikers being on the bench CIS in the middle and maybe Somerville out wide I think you're going to start seeing that what was also good about the uh at the weekend was about the way our front three were were mixing around because one minute kudas was out left next minute he was in the middle next minute he was out right uh Bowen came in the middle you had Antonio out left and doing that means it gives L even more options so that was good to see but I'm never going to well I will predict and I will probably get it wrong every time but I just think we're going to start seeing a lot more rotation uh of our first 11 than even you or I would imagine there you go thank you for watching uh please do um uh leave your comments below as to what you think especially about soek you know am I right in thinking it's because uh he reminds a lot of fans of David Moyes and that is that why a lot of fans have got it in for him uh or is it any other reason you let me know thank you for watching please do become a subscriber if you've enjoyed the content and please do hit the like button and I will see you all again very very soon