Former West Ham Striker Slams Tomas Soucek Decision-Makers

Former West Ham striker Bobby Zamora had slammed the referees behind the decisions to send off Tomas Soucek against Fulham. Soucek was given his marching orders after catching Aleksandar Mitrović with his elbow in the build-up to a Hammer’s freekick.

At first, the referee Mike Dean took no action to punish the midfielder. Lee Mason on VAR, however, reviewed the incident and decided to send Dean to the monitor to have another look at the incident.

After reviewing the footage many times, Dean came back on the field of play and delivered the red card to Soucek. The 25-year-old was in disbelief as he protested his innocence to the referee. It appeared that even Mitrović, the player who received the elbow, tried to talk the referee out of the decision.

West Ham star player Tomas Soucek faces a three-match ban if his red card against Fulham is not rescinded.

Post-match, Zamora laid into the referee while on the panel for Skysports. The striker called out Dean’s decision and labelled it “the Mike Dean show once again, and I’d like to think in the week it will get overturned.

Zamora also took to social media to further criticise Dean. The striker tweeted and called Dean ‘absolutely clueless’ as well as “worst in the game” amongst other things.

Zamora was not the only player to condemn the decision. Ex-players and pundits from all over have been left scratching their heads at the decision. Some of the people that have disagreed with the decision are Peter Crouch, Jack Grealish, Andy Gray and Gary Lineker.

The decision to send off Soucek came late in the game and didn’t seem to affect the result. The two London sides played out a competitive draw, though Fulham were probably the better of the two sides. West Ham have now sent an appeal to the FA to get the decision rescinded and lift Soucek’s potential ban.