Ahead of West Ham United’s trip to Crystal Palace on Saturday, Declan Rice, who is set for a 200th Premier League appearance, has the Last Word…
Things have happened so quickly but it’s amazing to potentially reach 200 Premier League appearances against Crystal Palace.
You hear a lot of ex-footballers talk about how quickly it goes. And for me, these last four years have absolutely flown by.
And while I am still only 24, and there is such a long way to go, it feels like a real milestone to hit. Some top players don’t even get to play 100 or 150 games, so 200 is a massive milestone and I’m really grateful.
Of course, to wear the armband as well over the past two seasons is a massive honour. It’s really special, especially doing it for this Club. If you look at the captains West Ham has had and the top players too, it’s special. I have been loving it and I really relish it as well.
But it’s now about moving onto the next 200! And I still have parts of my game I want to improve and develop. I want to be able to get on the ball more and dictate play more. For me, it is about getting on the ball as much as possible, making key passes and keep adding goals to my game.
Scoring a goal is the best feeling but I am running out of celebrations now! If I score against Crystal Palace – I don’t know what I will do.
I don’t score enough to have a trademark celebration. But I promised Kevin Nolan I’d do the ‘Chicken’ if I score so I might have to get that out!
We all know that we’ve not had the best of seasons in the Premier League, but our European form has been incredible. And, now we are finding our feet in the league, and we have reached the semi-finals of the UEFA Europa Conference League as well, it is about pushing on.
We don’t see Europe as a distraction at all. For me, I love playing every three days and the lads do as well. It has been three games a week for the last few years, so it’s just been built into what we have to deal with now. I enjoy the schedule but the focus is back on the Premier League this weekend.
As we head into the match against Crystal Palace there has been a good run of performances and we were unlucky not to get anything from Liverpool on Wednesday.
Even with that defeat, we have only lost two matches in the last eleven games. We want to win as many matches as we can, and, of course, we want to lift a trophy as well.
Hopefully, it can be a big end to the season for us. And we want that continue our good start to 2023 at Selhurst Park on Saturday.
