Tomas Soucek and and Declan Rice problems set to continue as David Moyes makes admission.
In other news…Report claims West Ham are now very likely to sign 22-year-old Italian
Soucek and Rice are two of the most important players that Moyes has at his disposal at the London Stadium, if not the most important.
The Hammers boss has a big problem on his hands this season, however. And it is all his own fault.
Last season, the Czech Republic and England internationals both excelled for West Ham.
Soucek, 26, was deployed as a box-to-box midfielder but was often found in advanced positions.
Meanwhile, Rice, 22, sat in front of the back four and provided a shield for our defenders.
There aren’t may better players in the Premier League than Soucek at perfectly timing runs into the box to get on the end of crosses.
And there certainly aren’t any better than Rice at intercepting the opposition’s play.
For some reason though, Moyes has swapped the two players around this season. And it’s not really working.
Tomas Soucek and and Declan Rice problems set to continue as David Moyes makes admission
Surely for the good of the team, Moyes needs to change things back to the way they were.
Moyes hinted that that won’t be happening, however, when speaking to Football.London today:
“I think Tomas gets the praise, certainly internally. We’re pushing him hard to get the goals that he got last year. We like his work ethic – we love his work ethic. He’s a real threat in the box as well so we’re hoping he can get a few more goals to go along with his high running stats. Tomas will get his goals as the season goes on. Declan Rice has got other attributes which will get him goals as well, so I’m hoping we end up with two midfield players with good goal returns this season.”
Those comments are baffling. Soucek’s problems this season have been clear and obvious for everyone to see. He’s just not a holding midfielder and never has been.
Playing Rice as the advanced midfielder and Soucek as the deep-lying one really is not playing to either of their strengths.
And it is clearly proving to be to the detriment of West Ham as a team.
Read also: ‘I was like OK…’: Jesse Lingard has just proven how valuable Mark Noble is to West Ham
Hopefully Moyes reverts back to the way things were sooner rather than later.
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