Tomas Soucek says that West Ham’s 5-0 thrashing against Chelsea is down to the players not following the game plan.

West Ham have suffered yet another heavy defeat this season, this time at Stamford Bridge. A completely uninspiring, lacklustre and abysmal performance allowed Chelsea to put 5 past them.

Apart from Mohammed Kudus and Jarrod Bowen, every single player was awful. Much of the criticism however has been pointed towards the manager, but midfielder Tomas Soucek says the blame lies with the players. “I have to say we really deserved it because we did not do what we were told,” he told the official site. “We did some good individual things but not as a team. Going forward and going backwards, we did many things wrong, and we got punished for that. On the other hand, we could have scored a few goals, but we conceded a lot of easy goals.”

“As a team, we have to have great spirit and be compact all the time. If someone goes pressing, someone else stays all the time, and the opposite cannot work like that, and we got punished for that today.”

While the Hammers are now out of the race for European football, the Czech Republic captain is still eager for the Hammers to bounce back, especially in their final home game against Luton. “It is two games to go now, and next week is so important because it is our last game at home, and we want to bounce back, and we want to win for our fans because they deserve to see a win in the last home game of the season.”

“Today, it was so poor for everyone, but now we have to concentrate on our last game at home,” Soucek stated.

Defensively, West Ham have been one of the worst teams in the league, conceding the most goals outside of the bottom 3. It is something that the midfielder could not explain, but acknowledges that it is unacceptable for a team competing for Europe. “We want to be in Europe again, we played in Europe for three years in a row and we enjoyed it and our fans enjoyed it.”

“We wanted to be successful as a team and teamwork on the pitch is so important if we want to be successful.”

“I want it to be hard [to beat us]. I want to be successful as a team because this team can be successful, and we showed we have been successful in three or four years in a row.”

“Now we have been beaten heavily in the last couple of away games in a row by five goals and this cannot happen. This can happen maybe once a season with unlucky goals, but not like that. Just now, we have one week to go to our home stadium and get a result for our fans.”

“Chelsea showed their quality, and we got punished. As I said, it is two weeks to go and we have time to show respect to our Club and get the win for our fans.”