I’ve seen Simms play live once, against us I believe, so I don’t purport to be an expert at all - but I do think the modern analytical football fan has an instinctive habit of inverting someone’s other qualities when they have an extreme one.
Like, as soon as it was obvious Dan James could run very, very fast - it automatically worked against him as an actual technical footballer. Everyone started questioning his ability and implied he was a limited footballer. Over recent years, as soon as a full-back showed top offensive ability, they automatically became a defensive liability, and a player like Ellis Simms, or that Brobbey centre-forward playing for Holland at U17 are obviously big and strong - they become average footballers too.
Not sure if this applies to Simms on this occasion, but there is a haste to profile people. Without wanting to drag out the whole ‘big and black’ debate again, I’ve seen the same happen a few times. It took a while and a fair bit of explanation by those who actually watch the player to establish on here that Koulibaly was actually technically very good on the ball. I remember calling someone on it in the thread that announced we had signed Bailly. Someone, who doubtless had never watched him, said ‘excellent, now we just need a defender who is good on the ball to partner him’. When I asked why they assumed Bailly himself was not good on the ball, as he actually is, they didn’t really have anything to say.
Apologies for the tangent, as I said, I’m no expert on Simms, I just found the reference to his size in relation to his technical ability so predictable. May be perfectly justified on this occasion.
