When you and your team are performing well, being a professional footballer is fun.
Positive displays and results breed confidence and lead to a productive atmosphere around the training ground and the stadium, while the praise and adulation roll in from the media and supporters alike.
The pressure remains, but it is a different type of pressure to that which pervades and weighs heavily when things are not going so well.
If your individual form dips, or the team’s results tail off, especially following a period of success, confidence drops, and that productive atmosphere can become destructive, while that praise and adulation turns to criticism and, worse still, abuse.
Where before everything was sunny and bright, a dark cloud hangs over everything you do, your mood is affected, and being a professional footballer is anything but fun.
At times like that, it takes a strong mentality, a united dressing room and a supportive family and friends to remind you that, while football is important and plays a big part in your life, it does not define it.
Tomáš Souček’s career, like so many others’, has been filled with highs and lows.
The 27-year-old was rejected by two Czech clubs as a youngster before proving his worth with Viktoria Žižkov, Slovan Liberec and Slavia Prague, where he won four trophies and a call-up to the national team.
He has since twice been named Czech Footballer of the Year awards, been appointed Czech Republic captain and was voted Hammer of the Year after leading West Ham United’s charge into Europe in his first full season in Claret and Blue – all while helping his wife Natalia and young daughter Tereza settle into life in England during the COVID pandemic and prepare for the birth of their second child Karolina, who arrived earlier this month.
Having come through that, things became more challenging for the tireless midfielder earlier this year. The goals which flowed in 2020/21 proved harder to come by. Meanwhile, as captain of the Czech national team, Souček has had to deal with the fallout following his country’s failure to qualify for the 2022 FIFA World Cup and relegation from UEFA Nations League A.
For a player who gives absolutely everything, every day, and a sensitive, amiable man who is gracious with every demand placed upon him, it has been a difficult period, particularly with his wife Natálie having the couple’s second child, Karolina, earlier this month, but with the support of his teammates, his manager and coaches, and his family, the No28 is coming through it and returning to the form that have made him a hero – and made being a professional footballer fun.
Our second little girl ❤️ Karolína pic.twitter.com/fRl25gJzRk
— Tomáš Souček (@tomassoucek28) October 21, 2022
I've been here nearly three years now, and every season has been totally different since I came.
This season, we made a lot of changes at the beginning, new signings, and the guys came to the Premier League, which is probably the most difficult in the world.
So, everyone has set up the team spirit to go in the good way again and I hope that now we are finally settled because we have to say that the first five or six games weren't the best in the way we wanted, and the start wasn’t good enough.
But now I am happy with the team, how we meet at the training ground and how we play in our sessions, and we have showed that on the pitch.
We struggled, so that’s why I’m so happy that we’ve found a way so quickly because if we’d struggled in a few more games we could have been fighting relegation all season. Now, we still have a big chance to get back to a higher position, so I am happy.
At the start, I didn’t play my best, especially in the first five games.
I tried to do even more because I was frustrated that I didn't do best on the pitch, so I did even more at the training ground.
It’s very difficult to be at the top level in the whole of your career. I always give my maximum on the pitch, but sometimes I do not play to my best. When this happens, I try different things to get back to my best.
It’s not always easy. A lot of people look at our lives and can only see that we play football for fun, but the other side is very different.
I like to play every game and I’m very disappointed even at the training ground when the gaffer tells me I need to rest and I say ‘No, I want to play with the guys!’.
For me, honestly, it’s much harder mentally than physically because to concentrate on every game and give my maximum and get my adrenaline levels right is very hard, especially when you have difficult opponents against you.
I am not a person who just goes to play for myself on the pitch, I care about others and care if someone feels bad so I want to help my teammates to get back on track.
As captain of my national team, I know everyone in the Czech Republic speaks about it and about us, whether things are going well or not so well.
And I also know they speak about West Ham because we have two players here in myself and Vladimír Coufal, so I know Czechs really watch us. Of course, fans in England also talk about us, so I am aware of this and the pressure is big.
You can feel the pressure every day and while you are the same footballer, your performance as a player can be totally different because of that pressure and what it does to you mentally.
I believe that now, many players are very good physically, but mentally they are destroyed by this pressure, and mentality is very important.
My wife and I have had our second child and I was looking forward to it because after the first one was born I had maybe the best season of my life!
It was the season before West Ham bought me – 2018/19, when I scored 18 goals, won the Czech domestic double and reached the Europa League quarter-finals with Slavia – and I remember for all of this time my baby supported me in the first year of her life, so I hope the second one will be the same and I’m so happy she has been born.
I have to take together like life and football but also keep them a little bit separate because I have to be ready at home and also at the stadium.
It’s good because my wife helps me all the time.
It’s true that ever since we came to England, it has been the biggest challenge for all of us in our lives, because we came here and one or two months later COVID arrived so we were in a hotel for two months and we couldn’t really go outside.
That was tough, as was the language barrier as we couldn’t speak good English, but it was a challenge and we stuck at it and now we are happy we are here.
We speak the language and our daughter goes to a nursery and speaks English, which is great, so in the future when I retire, we will think about what we fought for and be very happy about what we did to be successful.
Honestly, I am proud, proud for everyone, proud for my parents for what they have helped me achieve, proud for my family around me and also for myself.
I played many sports when I was young and I wanted to become a good sportsman and follow my hero Tomáš Rosický by becoming a footballer.
I remember when I was young, I met Antonín Panenka who everyone knows for his penalty in the European Championship final in 1976, and got a photo with him.
Now, because of that, whenever kids come to me and want a photo or an autograph, or young players come to me at the training ground, I hope I can help them grow up and learn how to be their best selves on the pitch and off the pitch.
I want every kid to know we are not just footballers, but to show them how we can respect each other and ourselves, not just in football but in our lives as people.
Of course, the Premier League is a different league and we have new players who came from Italy, from France and from many different teams.
So, it takes time, not only to change league, but also to get connected with the other players.
I am so happy how we get this so quickly, because sometimes it can take maybe a season to get settled in at a Club.
We just have to carry on and build even more relationships with each other and build a better spirit, even if it is already high, so we can go higher in the Premier League table and win our group and play in the UEFA Europa Conference League knockout stages next year.
We have made a big change in my time at the Club.
When I came, I came as an international player, but we had maybe only four or five internationals at the time.
I was coming to the best league in the world and it was a dream to be joining West Ham, but we didn’t have many international players and we were playing to fight relegation, so things have totally changed.
Now, we have built a team and maybe when I came we were happy only to win our fight against relegation, but now we want to fight for European football.
It has been a very quick change because, from what I saw in the past, this Club was happy when they finished 12th or tenth, and we are tenth now and we are not happy, we are disappointed.
I remember once, just after I came, we lost away at Manchester City, 2-0, and everyone in the team was quite happy because we played quite well, but I was frustrated because we lost the game and this is the key point – now every game we lose or we draw, we are disappointed, and that's great.
We have this winning mentality and this is a big change.
Also, with the Club, all the fans and the workers want to be as high as possible and we go into every game and we think about winning.
We have players who are used to winning and fighting for titles and that's the point – you can have good players, but they just play for fun rather than to win, and you need a winning mentality and players who want to fight for the team and to score goals in difficult positions and when you’re under pressure.
That’s how you can be successful in football, and we have this mentality now and we want to continue with this and build an even stronger one, not just in Premier League matches but every day at the training ground.
