They say that success has many fathers, but failure is an orphan. The latter certainly seems to apply to Roko Simic, who appears to be very much out here on his own.
At a time when Cardiff were crying out for jam today, the club signed the striker so desperately needed late in the summer and promptly loaned him to their sister club KV Kortrijk, who already had a stable of options in that position. A mere 143 minutes played later, Simic is back, more by circumstance than design because the club were unable to loan him out for a second time.
Despite making the bench last week, Omer Riza appears less than keen though, playing down his prospects at every opportunity. Yousef Salech has since been acquired and has maximised the opportunities afforded him thus far. Erol Bulut seemed pretty mystified by Simic too. So, what happens now?
I think the first thing to acknowledge is that Simic is only 21 and was 20 when he joined. He’s very young, in a new country, looking to make a name for himself in a new team and league. Football fans tend to treat football players like numbers on a spreadsheet, that can be moved around at will, but there is a lot of upheaval involved in a transfer, especially abroad. You want to adapt, integrate and to justify the investment in you. What you really don’t want is for everyone, in and out of the club to point and say; ‘who is THIS guy?’
Embed from Getty ImagesFootball is a meritocracy and you live and die by your performances on the pitch, but you can’t make your mark without opportunity. He scored for the reserves, courtesy of a sublime Aaron Ramsey assist, demonstrating his attributes. Latching on to a through ball, he raced forward, drew the goalkeeper and dinked the ball past him. Height, speed, poise, what’s not to like, yet it did not appear to make any real difference.
You can read Riza’s comments on Simic as unnecessarily harsh, or a challenge. Some people will view it as tough love, but there has to be love in the first place before you can make it tough.
Steve Morison split the room, but the sight of Max Watters being withdrawn late in the first half of a game, when the change could easily have waited until half-time, remains etched in my mind. Watters was devastated and remained sat on the bench throughout the break. It effectively signalled the end of his Cardiff career.
Its very difficult to see the logic in the Simic signing. On the one hand, he has a good grounding. He started at Dinamo Zagreb, before breaking through at Lokomotiva Zagreb. He was snapped up for four million euros as a 17-year-old by Red Bull Salzburg, a club backed by an organisation with the most sophisticated scouting network in the game. He plundered 19 goals in 24 games for their feeder club. After half a season on loan at FC Zurich, he headed for South Wales on a four-year deal.
Embed from Getty ImagesWas the plan for him to ultimately play for Kortrijk, as appears to be the case with Ryotaro Tsunoda, who has yet to represent Cardiff and maybe never will? I always assumed there would be a more formal connection between both of Vincent Tan’s teams and if done properly, it could be mutually beneficial. Isaak Davies certainly benefitted from a year in Belgium and I’m sure others would too.
Perception is very important in football and if Cardiff had presented the Simic signing differently, all this uncertainty and confusion could have been avoided. Had they managed expectations and explained that he was one for the future, with a path laid out for him, there still would have been frustration at the lack of a current striker, but it would have been seen as something to look forward to.
Instead, Simic has the whiff of Etien Velikonja, another ‘club signing’ that the manager at the time, Malky Mackay, did not want or need. He got 45 minutes in the last game of the season, was hooked at half-time and never heard of again. What even is a club signing anyway? That alone deserves some degree of explanation because there’s nothing about the concept that strikes you as a good idea or a smart use of funds.
First-team players have a mission, which is to keep Cardiff in the Championship and try to ascend the table. Academy players also have a pathway to the senior squad, but I’m not sure what Simic has and I really feel for him. There is no indication that there is a plan in place for him and he does not appear to have a great deal of support either, at least in public. I’m really rooting for him, but the odds appear to have been stacked against him from the very beginning.