West Ham go into the new season as favourites! Will Tomas Soucek build on his incredible stats from last season?

The Hammers kick off the competitive season with the underrated Magpies of Newcastle. According to experts, Newcastle is one of the candidates for relegation from the top English competition. Czech national team players Tomáš Souček and Vladimír Coufal will probably not be missing from the West Ham starting line-up.

In England, Tomáš Souček has made an incredible name for himself among fans and experts alike. Before the game, analytical site Perform Stats pointed out that the Czech midfielder had the most ever runs into the opponent’s sixteen of all central midfielders in the Premier League.

How many? A whopping 222 shots, leaving a huge hole behind him. In second place is Manchester United’s skilful Portuguese Bruno Fernandes with 198 shots. But what are we going to think, the Red Devils are a much more offensive team than West Ham. Third in the number of runs into the box was Pascal Groß of Brighton (167).

The prestigious WhoScored server has placed the Czech midfielder in the top ten of last season. According to the metrics, he left behind Mason Mount or Mahrez and ranked an incredible 5th.

West Ham fans know very well what gems they have in “Czech Mates”. Moreover, in the Premier League, right back Vladimir Coufal has sometimes been overlooked at the expense of Soucek.

But Coufal had a fantastic performance at the Euro and if he can build on his European championship, soon the experts and servers may have two Czech names on their lists.

WhoScored, OptaJoe, Livesport