Xavi Simons was contacted with some clubs this summer, and the boy was named after the legend of Barcelona, Xavi Hernández, the latest goal of Chelsea. But do you have a “foot” of Cole Palmer in Stamford Bridge?
Mainly an attacking midfielder, Simons is very versatile and has played in many different positions in recent years. Last season, he spent about 3/4 of his competition on the left wing (75%), 16% in the center and 9% on the right wing. A lot of time in “left wing” is with the role of 10 left in the 3-3-2-2 squad. Simons offers more pitch width than Palmer – players more as a number 10, so it is definitely likely to be able to play with the team.
The ability to shot from the left wing of Simons is not very effective last season. He could not score a goal when he shot the ball outside the penalty area on the left, with most of the goal from the shots in the middle.
It is also worth noting that almost all 66 shots of Simons in every arena last season are with the right foot, only two shots with the left foot. Therefore, like Palmer, Simons will often appear in the central areas when trying to finish.
In the league, Palmer scored more than Simons 1 goal without a penalty (11-10), and more than 1 assist (8-7). However, it should be noted that Palmer played more than 1,000 minutes in the league than Simons in the 2024/25 season.
Palmer is usually the center in Chelsea's play, like Simons for Leipzig. The average he has 70.9 touches every 90 minutes in the Bundesliga last season, more than Palmer in the Premier League (56.5). The Dutch player also has more passes every 90 minutes (46.1) compared to Palmer (36.9), while both have similar passing accuracy (Simons 82.9%, Palmer 83.1%). Those figures show that they are effective and similar players when they have the ball, although the question is whether Simons can recreate it in the Premier League.
The average Palmer creates more opportunities every 90 minutes (2.1) compared to Simons (1.7), but both have creative ability and if they play together for the Blues, you can imagine this person's threat creates space for the other.
Assuming that Simons will mainly play on the left wing, where rookie Jamie Gittens is Winger, the only pure left now of Chelsea, with Raheem Sterling expected to leave and Mykhailo Mudryk is suspended. Players like Pedro Neto and Jo Pedro can play there, but with Gittens and Simons are potential options, Chelsea will have two quite different solutions, allowing Neto to play on the right wing where he is probably more effective when cutting on with his left foot, and Jo Pedro plays in the middle.
A large part of Simons's play is to go the ball, one of 11 players who try to go the ball more than 100 times in the Bundesliga last season. However, he had the worst of the successful rate among those 11 players (32.7%).
However, Simons still has some fun running with the ball. 15 balls to create his chance is the 7th highest in the Bundesliga last season. More impressive, only Marroush and Jamal Musiara (both 5 times) have more goes to end with a goal than Simons (4).
Simons also made many taller -high balls (123). Only the Chelsea players can match with 5.1 moves to the ball every 90 minutes of Simons in the league last season (at least 1,000 minutes of play), Noni Madueke (6.1), who came to Arsenal, and Neto (5.6).
It doesn't take much time for Simons to get used to Chelsea's tactics, especially when it comes to status transitions. Enzo Maresca's team has the second most fast -countered shot in the Premier League last season (51), while Leipzig has the second largest shot in the Bundesliga (44).
If Simons could not hold the ball through the opponent's defense, he would try to pass through them. Only Michael Olise and Florian Wirtz (both 25) tried to make more cross -route more than Simons in the Bundesliga last season (22), although he only ranked fifth in the number of successful cross -route passes (9). That is the number of times the same effort as Palmer recorded in the Premier League (12 times).
Looking at the overall attacks, Simons is very important for Leipzig in the 2024/25 season, even if they do not have the best season, at the end of the 7th place in the Bundesliga. He recorded the highest number of phases participating in the chain of live balls for the club (126), and it was almost equal between shots (43), the opportunity to create (40) and the participating phases to build the game (43), showing that he could do everything.
By the way, Simons is also very positive when there is no ball. Only eight players regain control of the ball in the end of the last third more often than him in the Bundesliga last season (21), while no British teammate in Leipzig could match his total, which was even more impressive when he only played 25 out of 34 matches.
If a transfer takes place, comparisons with Palmer may be offered, or maybe with Liverpool's Wirtz, but we can use Opta Player Comparisons to see Simons like the most in last season from the top 5 tournaments in Europe.
Romano Schmid of Werder Bremen is the nearest person (83%), followed by the young player Eliesse Ben Seghir of Monaco (81%), but most notably, Simons compares well with Arsenal's Martin Odegaard, with a similarity of 80%in their output parameters, especially in areas such as going to the ball, passing the ball into the penalty area and creating chances.
As Chelsea showed in the United States with the FIFA Club World Cup campaign, they were building an impressive young squad, and Simons wanted to be part of that.
Is Simons Cole Palmer of the Netherlands? Well, that will not be a fair label to put on him at this time. On the other hand, Simons spent his whole life called Xavi, so being put on a pressured name to live with would not be new to him.
