Emile Smith-Rowe: The Introverted Genius

A footballer playing the human game

As the dog and I were sitting on a rock outcrop and contemplating the landscape of hazy blueish trees shimmering in the spring sun, the idea struck me that sensitive people are an evolutionary advantage. Being sensitive to tiny subtle shifts in weather patterns or animal rhythms or social ambience is an enormous survival advantage. Not only for noticing and managing oncoming conditions but as a wellspring for ideas and intuitions.

I’ll bet the small and powerful perceptions and inspirations that improved the hand axe or understood that sickness lies in these plants (and cures in those) came from sensitive (and introverted) people embedded in the rhythms of existence. Paying attention, listening attentively, thinking carefully and being observant to sensory details are all powerful attributes in a human. And in a footballer. So I thought of Emile Smith Rowe and his quiet gentle power.

So when we got back I wrote this for you. Enjoy.

Screen grab from YoutTube

There’s something about the way Emile Smith-Rowe floats about, the way his body seems to have been liberated from his mind, free from the weight of thought. He’s perfectly weighted and balanced, something of the kung-fu master about his frame and his efficiency, light, loose and planted all at the same time.

He has an intimacy with the ball, as if it were a loyal compadre eagerly watching his every move, calculating the best speed and spin to always be ready, always perfectly placed for the next action. And there’s a joy between them, ESR and the ball, like two foals running about just for the sheer hell of it. It’s wonderful watching ESR play.

His dribbling reminds me of a mogul skier bounding down the slope, calculating the optimal route, the possibilities, the hindrances, navigating at full speed a path through the terrain, always reconfiguring, always adjusting. Scampering across the pitch, socks down, unpredictable in his course, firing off passes, taking the ball in his stride. All eyes on him as he’s scanning on the half-turn and driving the team up-field, always up-field.

Photo by Alex Lange on Unsplash

On the pitch is where ESR expresses himself with abandon, where he isn’t burdened by social expectations. Off the pitch he emanates shyness, a perpetual under-bubble of social uncertainty. Of course the world through a screen is not the world so I can’t know this, but my intuition whispers that, when meeting strangers, Emile might smile and be quietly polite but avoid eye contact as he bides his time and hopes for an escape route. This is no criticism. Shyness is part of the repertoire of graces that are the human condition. It’s a beautiful way to be.

But, unfortunately these days, sensitivity or introversion is so often described as a handicap to success, something to “work on” and “get over”. This strange idea comes from a social world that’s forgotten that being introverted is as much of a superpower as being extroverted. We saw this mistake in real time when Albert Stuivenberg encouraged ESR to speak up during a post-game analysis, “Speak a little bit louder, I don’t hear you!” Stuivenberg said like a grouchy teacher on a school trip.

Behind Stuivenberg’s cajoling lies the assumption that somehow Emile’s shyness is stunting his creativity, holding back his expressiveness and hindering him from taking charge. “I tried to get the ball, and he just pushed me out the way” ESR replies as they analyse game footage and Stuivenberg punches his palm in agreement, “You’ve got to make things happen because you are a creative player, I want to see you more in those situations”. Stuivenberg was encouraging ESR to abandon his reserve and inhibitions, to express himself freely without self-consciousness. Stuivenberg was speaking on behalf of the modern world where we’re expected to abandon whole chunks of the human condition to (supposedly) gain an advantage.

Screen Grab You Tube

Arteta knows that ESR is a talent, has a work ethic and that real-game attitude in training that Arteta demands. ESR’s an athlete flowing with technical ability whilst being described as “humble”, a buzz word for Hale Enders on the learning curve. So why the persistent rumours he’ll be sold? Why the scarcity of game time after his operation? If anyone could have shone in that drudgery that was the Nottingham Forest game it was Smith-Rowe.

Edu and Arteta are building a team of personalities that will flourish in their system and deal with the pressures of stress and fame. Football managers especially love a “big” personality. Take Xhaka, famously a team player and a leader with a big personality. But what of the introverted players? How are they described? Freddie Ljungberg offered wilting praise of ESR in an interview by saying “Sometimes, when you’re a little bit shy, people can misunderstand that. For me, I don’t care, I think he’s a great human being.”

ESR is a modern player advertising contemporary values. A innocent poster boy for that (ridiculous) myth that if you work hard enough you’ll be rewarded (the hardest working people I know are rewarded with exhaustion and hardship). ESR loves sneakers and fashion and expressing his identity through consumption. But, if the rumours are true, like the countless football hopefuls cast aside on the road to professional contracts, ESR has an Achilles heel in Arteta’s mind. For all the bling, he’s just not demonstrative enough.

Before ESR went to Huddersfield Arsenal had said they wanted the loan to be both a test of ability but also “to develop him as a character”. Before Balogun went to Riems Arteta told him he wanted him to “develop as a man”, and to hear what people said about him off the pitch as much as on it. This is all sensible stuff. Arsenal are in the business of winning football matches and Arteta is using every possible angle to achieve this goal. Time is always of the essence in football. Everybody needs to win today, not tomorrow. There’s no room for patience. Even if you have a “process” you need to show a positive evolution toward your stated goals.

And as football fans we understand this attitude. We want to win too. We want success and trophies. We want our club managed in the right way. We want to feel the fleeting pride that winning brings. But there’s something here that’s pulling at me. Something that feels wrong when it comes to selling ESR. It’s not just the fact that sometimes patience is the best approach, after all, Arteta’s own career would have been over before it had even started under different management with less patience. The fact that Arsenal gave Arteta the time he needed is the first thing commentators mention in response to yet another managerial sacking. But this disquieting feeling I have goes deeper.

Photo by Jonathan Gensicke on Unsplash

What weighs on me are the values that underpin the choices we make. Let me put it this way. To win the Premiership Arsenal has to play two games. One ON the pitch and one OFF the pitch. The game on the pitch is regulated by a finite set of rules that govern the on-pitch behaviours, expectations and outcomes. The game on the pitch is a formulaic interaction designed to produce competition and winners. I’ve no problem with that. The ritualistic expression of Play within a finite set of rules is the essence of sport. It mimics human social relations and offers a symbolic space for identity creation and emotional expression. Sport is the ancient articulation of a self-conscious social animal. African wild dogs play and so do we, except we’ve got rules and an amazing away kit (oh that black and copper).

But Arsenal are also embedded in a set of values that govern the rules of the game off the pitch as well. A set of values that are not human-shaped (or even planet-shaped) but instead shaped by their own internal logic. And these values drive our behaviours, expectations and outcomes and that scares the hell out of me right now.

So, getting back to Emile Smith-Rowe. I see a very young and introverted player slowly expanding his enormous footballing potential. And I see a football club assessing how long this may take, and whether the style and skill he exhibits fits their evolving style of play. So far so good. But I see this happening at the behest of a value system that prefers to manipulate human behaviour to its own internal logic rather than a value system designed to nurture the human at the centre. I see a world where the logic of winning and growth supersedes the logic of nurturing human (and planetary) needs. And I’m disquieted (and occasionally scared to death) because I can’t see a way for the human to be put back in the driving seat.

Of course we want Arsenal to win games, but do we really want ESR to be abandoned just because he’s blessed with a common and beautiful human condition? If we’re not careful the logic of perpetual growth and success becomes ALL that counts and that destroy’s everything completely. Let’s not become a Meganaut club awash with trophies but devoid of humanity. Instead let’s celebrate the human spirit of play within a set of human values with humans in the centre.

Photo by Matt Collamer on Unsplash

If it were up to me I’d keep Emile Smith-Rowe because of his enormous potential, because he brings such joy to the game, and (strangely perhaps) because we humans need to stick together when the internal logic of our external value system is doing everything it can to pull us apart.

Oh and of course because I like it, I like it, I like it, I like it, I liiiike it, ohh oh ohh ohh Here we goooo, Saka and Emile Smith Rowe! I mean how could we sell half of the best lyric in football chanting!

So there you go fellow Gunners, normally I love a Forest, but after the weekend I’m feeling a little conflicted. I hope this light contemplation took your mind from our current slump and hopefully we’ll see ESR back on the pitch against Wolves. Have a great week and feel free to share your wonderful human thoughts in the comments.