Football is a game of opinions. The score line may be objective, but everything else around the sport is subjective. There is not a single way to determine who the best player in the world is. We are trying to make things more objective through data metrics, but at the end of the day until humans run the data we are inevitably going to bring our own biases to the table.
It’s simply impossible to be objective in football. Over my career as a journalist, I have had my fair share of ‘wrong’ opinions but also I’ve been lucky enough to get things right as well. Predicting Dominik Szoboszlai being a good pick for Liverpool years before he actually signed for the club is one of them.
Among my most controversial opinions has been one that at the time felt like it turned the entire Liverpool fanbase against me on social media. But I think over the last week, I have been proven right and all those who criticised my opinion were wrong to do so.
Why Neco Williams has proven me right recently
Back in 2021, I wrote an article where I likened Gareth Bale to Liverpool’s Neco Williams. I never once claimed that Williams would hit the tremendous heights Bale has reached in his career. However, I did make the point that like Bale, he could transition from a defensive full-back into more offensive wing-back or winger.
At the time, accounts on Twitter completely took my written words out of context with sensationalist posts like the one below. Immediately, I was filled with a deluge of posts attacking me on social media.
Most of them were very critical not just of me and my view, but also Neco Williams. For some reason, Williams seemed to have gotten a lot of flack from fans at the time. Pretty much all of it was unwarranted.
He was just a young player coming through the team and had made impressive strides. And while he never made it at Liverpool, he has gone onto have a successful career in the future.
Now 22-years-old, Williams has become a key pillar for Nottingham Forest and the Wales national team. Recently, he scored a stunning free-kick goal in an important Euro play off match against Finland, which was reminiscent of Bale at his peak. Before that, he scored an equally important equaliser against Turkey during the group-stages of the qualifying process.
In the Welsh national team, Williams has now become a fan favourite. Meanwhile, he is also performing at a high level in the Premier League. For example, among right-backs who average 5 defensive duels per 90, Williams has the best success rate in the league winning 62.5% of his 10.11 defensive duels. N
And among full-backs in the league, no one averages more successful defensive actions per 90 (13.35) than Williams this season. He also has the best dribble success rate among full-backs who averaged at least 3.5 dribbles per 90 (61.11%). So he’s got that ability going forward.
Obviously, his output is naturally going to be miniscule given Forest are one of the poorer sides in the league. However, those underlying numbers will suggest Williams is one of the best full-backs in the league. I’m confident with his recent performances the former Liverpool man has now proven me right.
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