Backa Topola 0 West Ham 1: Soucek pokes in late winner to send Hammers through… but they still face battle for top spot
TOMAS SOUCEK scored yet another late winner to ensure West Ham avoided Europa League embarrassment out in Serbia.
The Hammers produced one of their worst outings in Europe under David Moyes – on the cusp of failing to score for the first time in 20 continental outings.
But Soucek – fresh from earning the Hammers a stoppage time 2-1 victory away at Burnley – tapped home an 89th minute cross to cruelly down minnows TSC Backa Topola.
Before Soucek’s timely intervention, West Ham had dropped down to second in Group A – facing the prospect of needing to beat Freiburg in a nervy top-spot shoot-out on December 14 to avoid February’s play-offs against a Champions League opponent.
Now, they only need to avoid defeat against the Germans at the London Stadium to confirm qualification straight into the Europa League last 16.
Moyes’ men now have 18 wins from their last 20 games in Europe, with the Scot taking charge of his 32nd European game in 13 different countries for the Irons.
He will struggle to think of a more disappointing and boring showing in all that time – against a team experiencing football at this level for the first time in their history.
You have to feel for the 350 Irons fans who made the horror journey from East London, including a three-hour flight to Belgrade before a two-hour drive north towards the Hungarian border in the midst of winter.
West Ham appeared utterly uninterested in taking control of their Euro fate, the flat, tepid and sloppy performance of a group of players who could not wait to get the first flight back to the UK.
Czech international Soucek provided the tiniest of reliefs with his seventh goal of the campaign in all competitions and has now scored in his last five games for club and country.
And fortunately, the wrong end of a giant-killing eluded West Ham with opponents Backa Topola no where near clinical enough to take advantage.
Moyes made seven changes from West Ham’s Turf Moor triumph on Saturday. Jarrod Bowen did not travel to Serbia as he still nurses a knee injury, along with Michail Antonio, while Mohammed Kudus, Edson Alvarez and Vladimir Coufal also missing out through illness.
However, Moyes will still feel he had enough quality on show to get the job done, such as Soucek, Lucas Paqueta and James Ward-Prowse.
Just a second start for 19-year-old striker Divin Mubama was also promising, only for the academy star to be left isolated and feeding off scraps up top.
At the back, Aaron Cresswell’s clumsy misplaced pass in the 30th minute handed Aleksandar Cirkovic a chance to test Lukasz Fabianski with a deflected effort.
Said Benrahma had West Ham’s first shot on target two minutes later – a tame effort comfortably saved by Veljko Ilic.
Moyes would have seen at half time that Freiburg were 4-0 up and cruising against Olympiacos, but still waited until the 67th minute to make changes.
At first, the introductions of Danny Ings and Maxwel Cornet made no difference until the latter cut in from the right and delivered a quality cross to the back post for Soucek.
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