West Ham managed to secure their first points of the Premier League campaign under new manager Julen Lopetegui, beating Crystal Palace 2-0 at Selhurst Park.
Despite having less of the ball, with 42% possession, and creating one fewer “big chances” than the Eagles, the Hammers showed a clinical edge in their performance, opened up by Tomas Soucek in the 67th minute.
But it was not the goalscorer Soucek who stole the headlines after his performance, as one of West Ham’s new signings stepped up, putting in an outstanding all-round performance.
Max Kilman’s performance
West Ham’s new 6ft 4 machine, Max Kilman put in a man of the match performance against Palace, winning 4/4 of his aerial duels, 3/4 of his ground duels, to win 88% of his duels in total, and making six clearances.
But it wasn’t just the 27-year-old’s defensive work, as he marauded through midfield for the Hammers’ second goal, to provide Jarrod Bowen with an assist, giving West Ham a 2-0 lead, and in the end, all three points.
Having already worked with Lopetegui at Wolves, West Ham paid a £40m fee to bring Kilman to the club to work alongside his ex-manager, joining on a seven-year deal.
The defender’s quality on the ball is extremely important to the way Lopetegui wants to play, building out from the back, and playing through the lines, as Kilman showed yesterday, making 5/9 long balls, and playing two key passes, one of course leading to the goal.
Kilman’s centre back partner, Konstantinos Mavrapanos completed 42/54 of his passes, with a completion rate of 78%, whilst Kilman made 57/64 of his passes, with a completion rate of 89%, further stating his importance on the ball in build up for the Hammers.
Tomas Soucek’s performance
Despite Kilman taking the headlines, Soucek, as previously mentioned, did score the opening goal, and put in an impressive performance himself.
Kilman and Soucek’s performances
Stat Kilman Soucek
Goals 0 1
Assists 1 0
Touches 78 33
Accurate Passes 57 13
Ground Duels (won) 3/4 3/9
Aerial Duels (won) 4/4 4/7
Clearances 6 1
Tackles 1 3
Stats taken from Sofascore.
Soucek not only scored the important goal to open proceedings, but his strength in duels in midfield allowed West Ham to challenge for every second ball, and create chances through this. His seven duels won out of 16, whilst not being the highest win rate, shows he is challenging for everything in the middle, and producing extra possessions with his recoveries.
The 29-year-old is also alleviated of his deeper build-up duties, which are heavily taken up by midfielder partner’s Guido Rodriguez and Lucas Paqueta, This allows Soucek to have fewer touches deep (33 touches overall), and less passing responsibility, with more of an emphasis on arriving in the box to provide the important touch.
Lopetegui could allow Soucek to return to his best goalscoring form, by leaving build-up to his more pass-oriented midfielders, and defenders (Kilman), and allowing Soucek to do what he does best, contest duels and attack the box.
