Premier League Player Reveals Heartwarming Reason He Didn’t Celebrate Recent Goal
West Ham United midfielder Tomas Soucek isn’t exactly the world’s most prolific goal-scorer. Soucek, a 30-year-old who has been with the club since 2020, has 30 goals in 171 matches for the Hammers. So you’d excuse him if he lost his wits a bit after putting the ball in the back of the net.
But when Soucek scored in the 21st minute of West Ham’s Premier League match against Leicester City on Thursday, he instead had a subdued reaction. Typically, Soucek spins around almost like a whirling dervish to mimic the actions of a helicopter. But not this time. Instead, he pressed his hands down as if to tell everyone to calm down.
So, why no big helicopter celebration? As it turns out, Soucek had a remarkably thoughtful explanation.
“I didn’t think my normal helicopter celebration was the right thing to do because of what happened to the Leicester owner (Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha),” he said. “I wanted to show respect to our opponents.”
In 2010, Thaa billionaire Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha purchased Leicester City. He helped lead the club to an improbably Premier League title in 2015-16.
Sadly, on 27 October 2018, Srivaddhanaprabha’s AgustaWestland AW169 helicopter crashed outside of Leicester’s King Power Stadium shortly after taking off from the pitch. Srivaddhanaprabha, the pilots, and two other passengers were pronounced dead the following day.
It would have been easy for Soucek to use his customary celebration. After all, he wasn’t even playing in England at the time of the crash and nearly seven years later, he would’ve been excused had he not thought of the incident.
But instead, he did, and Leceister City fans were grateful for the gesture.
“Total respect to Soucek for this – that’s awareness levels you don’t normally see in a footballer,” one fan tweeted.
“What a lovely genuine level of self awareness. Which in the modern era of footballers is severely lacking,” said another.
Soucek and West Ham went on to win the match 2-0, moving them to 15th in the Premier League table. Leicester, meanwhile, remained in 19th and is sadly staring down the barrel of relegation with 11 matches remaining in the season.
You will not believe what Vladimir Coufal did during West Ham’s win over Leicester City
Vladimir Coufal has been missing through injury for West Ham since our defeat to Chelsea on February 3rd.
Vladimir Coufal moved to the London Stadium from Slavia Prague way back in October 2020, and just like his friend Tomas Soucek, he has been a great servant for West Ham.
The 32-year-old bleeds Claret and Blue, and some of the criticism he has received this season has been slightly unfair in my opinion.
Coufal is currently out with a slight hamstring problem, but he does have a chance of returning for our clash with Newcastle United on March 10th.
In any other era, the Czech Republic international would be considered as a Hammers legend.
However, football has changed now. Younger fans put more emphasis on XG and all other stats than they do desire, commitment and effort.
Coufal is a real man of the people, and he should be cherished by the West Ham fans, not criticised.
What Vladimir Coufal did during West Ham vs Leicester
Coufal obviously missed last night’s game through injury.
