West Ham United fan favourite Tomas Soucek is famed for a lot of things. His leadership, his height, perhaps more so than anything else his goalscoring ability from central midfield.
Soucek equalled a Premier League record when scoring off the bench in November’s 3-2 victory over Burnley.
Find the net against Manchester City on Saturday – albeit that is obviously easier said than done – and the former Slavia Prague captain will overtake Patrik Berger as the highest-scoring Czech player in the competition’s history.
In an interview with West Ham United’s official Ironcast podcast this week, meanwhile, Tomas Soucek merely confirmed what the supporters already knew.
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That Soucek is one of the leaders in the dressing room, stepping up following the departures of Michail Antonio, Aaron Cresswell and his close friend Vladimir Coufal. And that Soucek is one of the hardest trainers at Rush Green, too.
Carlton Cole witnessed his formidable work ethic up close when taking the Hammers kids on a tour around the first-team training ground. The club’s Loans and Pathways Manager was particularly taken aback by the raw speed of a footballer not especially renowned for his pace.
Carlton Cole could not believe how Tomas Soucek trained at West Ham United
Per BBC Sport, Soucek was clocked by Opta as the third-slowest outfield player in the Premier League last season. Above only Manchester City’s veteran playmaker Bernardo Silva, and former West Ham stalwart Craig Dawson, but behind Casemiro.
Yet, according to Cole, you still wouldn’t want to be caught in a foot race with West Ham’s number 28.
“You’re definitely one of the players who has a voice in the dressing room. Even me, as a striker, I would listen to you because of your output on the pitch and how much you lead on there,” Cole says opposite the man himself.
“When I was coaching [the youngsters], we were doing some runs, like a bleep test. We had to look at what the first-team’s scores were, that was what the younger boys had to aim for.
“Guess whose name was at the top of the running? One of our quickest runners [in the academy], he was really quick, but Soucek was light-years ahead of them!
“I said, ‘see the level? You have to catch ‘Souks’ if you want to be a professional footballer’. They didn’t catch him. It wasn’t even close!
“I saw his score and I was like, ‘this is impossible for these kids!’.”
Soucek praises former teammates Vladimir Coufal and Pablo Fornals
Soucek reckons he could run a kilometre in just two minutes and 47 seconds. If indeed he really is one of the slowest players in the Premier League, that really puts into perspective just how rapid the likes of Jarrod Bowen and Crysencio Summerville are when in full flow.
“I felt poor for my team-mates because I didn’t know if I should go hard and leave them behind [in the running drills]!” Soucek says with a laugh, before selecting two former teammates who also stood out due to their stamina and their seemingly Tardis-like lungs.
“Vlad [Coufal], he was a good runner. Pablo Fornals, he was really good.”
Nuno Espirito Santo is a huge fan of Premier League record-breaker
With three goals in seven starts across all competitions, 2025/26 is shaping up to be another campaign in which Soucek reminds everyone of the importance of timing, of sniffing out chances, and why the very best goalscorers make their own luck.
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Nuno raved about Soucek’s adaptability after seeing him score twice in successive Premier League matches from an unfamiliar centre-forward role in November. If West Ham manage to keep Man City at bay heading into the final moments at the Etihad, who better to bring off the bench?
“Look, I’ve played against Tomas many times,” the former Wolves, Tottenham Hotspur and Nottingham Forest coach said after Soucek marked his 250th Hammers appearance with a goal.
“And every time I’m analysing it, it was a nightmare stopping Tomas from getting into the box. He recognises space, he has the belief that not many players have.”
“I think we know Tomas. We cannot have anything but respect for Tomas. What he gives for the team is huge. He gives it all, no matter which position [he plays in]. I think you can play him full-back and he will deliver for us!”
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