Xavi Simons Gets Sancho’d in Ultimate Humiliation as Tottenham Warned Over Eberechi Eze Rival
For Xavi Simons, being dropped ought to have been the hardest part of the day. The £51 million signing, who is completely unfit, was then made to play for Spurs.
It will be interesting to see if the struggling Spursman receives the “ultimate humiliation” treatment, but there is much more value in disparaging Jadon Sancho than in Xavi Simons in general.
Lucas Bergvall’s early head injury gave Simons, who had been benched from the starting lineup to play Chelsea, an unanticipated chance to disprove Thomas Frank.
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Simons only provided a sad defence of his manager’s choice in a brief appearance that lasted just over an hour.
Frank feels that his £51 million playmaker has received “harsh” criticism, that it will take “time” for him to adjust, and that “it cannot be on one player to get the team ticking.”
He is correct, too. Even the most talented players frequently require patience and times of adjustment, and more of Simons’ teammates also have to contribute to the creative process.
However, a game he wasn’t trusted to start ultimately raised further concerns about why Spurs signed a player who doesn’t seem to fit with their goals.
On that front, there is still mystery. Spurs, whose ridiculous home struggles contributed to their lowest xG (0.05) of any team in a Premier League game this season, put up an awful black hole of a performance.
Simons was substituted in the 73rd minute, although he remained on the pitch for Spurs’ last attempt against their fierce rivals at home.
The Dutchman is both a victim and a contributing factor to this team-wide issue. Even though injuries to Dejan Kulusevski and James Maddison have complicated that specific equation, he was signed to provide at least some of the solution.
The team that attempted to sign Simons in the summer had flashes of potential. A beautiful chip into Mohammed Kudus in the second half and a body feint to avoid the excellent Moises Caicedo demonstrated why Chelsea reached personal terms with the 22-year-old.
However, Jamie Carragher responded to that same move with a lecture about the “intensity” of the Premier League.
With a display of effortless muscle, Reece James sent Caicedo sprawling to the ground near the halfway mark as soon as Simons had surged past him. Simons spent the majority of the game there.
There aren’t many players that seem to take as much pleasure in exploring blind alleys. He lost the ball seven times; only Joao Pedro, the game-winning goal scorer, had a higher total.
The entire Spurs team was terrible. Their play lacked originality and independent thought. The thought of having the ball seemed to terrify almost every player.
Rodrigo Bentancur had to muster the will of 427 men towards the end of the first half in order to avoid passing the ball all the way back to Guglielmo Vicario.
Instead, he had to turn into the sea of Chelsea bodies because the supporters were already jeering at the failure of another forward attempt.
Although Caicedo is an excellent player, the fact that the squad he is playing against has a huge collective pressing trigger doesn’t help at all.
In the lead-up to the goal, the Chelsea midfielder won the ball twice before passing it to Pedro for the last touch.
Simons could have played more of a hospital ball back to Micky van de Ven if he had delivered it on a stretcher and informed it that there were no beds available, but Spurs recovered after Djed Spence was robbed.
When Spurs revealed Simons’ capture in a parody of how Arsenal revealed Eberechi Eze, they were keen to “let it all work out.”
Frank doesn’t appear to be getting any closer to solving this problem, and the Gunners won that deal.
It turns out that Simons also receives the “ultimate humiliation” treatment because things are so horrible.
