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Proud Soucek ready for Denmark

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Tomas Soucek’s Czech Republic were big underdogs to beat Holland and are in the same position for the upcoming game against the fancied Danes.

But they will be showing no fear after their great result and with the two Hammers – Tomas and Vladi  in great nick – they could again upset the odds, much like Soucek did last season when he was the subject of many Premier League Free bets due to his goal scoring prowess.

Tomas’ pride in leading his team this far is obvious and it’s now all set up a quarter-final meeting with the Danes on Saturday.

Nether he or Vladi is showing any reaction to a long and tough campaign with the Hammers and were undoubtedly the leaders of the pack against the 10 man Netherlands.

In that game the red card made a big difference to the outcome of the match, but credit must be given to Jaroslav Šilhavý’s men, who were able to control the game with the man advantage and a goal from Tomas Holes as well as a late effort from top scorer Patrik Schick helped seal their progress into the next round.

And it’s now a close call for many of us Irons between England or the Czechs as most of us continue to support both teams.

Tomas is naturally thrilled to have left his team and has been talking to www.whufc.com about the Republic’s progress.

He said: ” It’s a great honour [to wear the captain’s armband]. I wanted the boys to be able to rely on me on and off the field.

“We work hard . The Netherlands was the favourite – they have one star next to another – but we didn’t let them into the game so much and I’m very happy how we ended it in the second half.

“[We play Denmark next and] they are also great, we have to prepare for them to make it look like today. There will be plenty of time to prepare, but our journey through the tournament definitely does not have to end.”

Sunday’s victory over Netherlands was played in front of a 53,000 crowd in Budapest and Souček was thrilled to share the moment with the Czech supporters.

“It was amazing, over 50,000 fans and ours supported us throughout the match,” he added.

“We are glad that we were able to give it back to them with performance and a win.”

Czech Republic’s Euro 2020 quarter final tie will be played in Azerbaijan at the Baku Olympic Stadium on Saturday and a semi-final tie with England could await the winners.

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Hugh Southon is a lifelong Iron and the founding editor of ClaretandHugh. He is a national newspaper journalist of many years experience and was Bobby Moore's 'ghost' writer during the great man's lifetime. He describes ClaretandHugh as "the Hammers daily newspaper!"

Follow on Twitter @hughsouthon