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Adam Smith Reveals "Relentless" Challenge of Being a Premier League Veteran
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- Adam Smith Reveals "Relentless" Challenge of Being a Premier League Veteran
Adam Smith Reveals "Relentless" Challenge of Being a Premier League Veteran
There is a moment every older footballer knows is coming...
You have spent 60 or 70 minutes battling through a Premier League game, your legs are beginning to feel the miles, and then the opposition makes a substitution... a fresh, rapid 21-year-old walks onto the pitch.
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For Adam Smith, it is a feeling he knows all too well.
Sixteen years after "Smudge" joined the Cherries for the very first time, AFC Bournemouth Roundtable is completing its trilogy of stories about the AFCB club stalwart, focusing on his brutally honest insights into what it is like to be an older player trying to survive in the modern Premier League.
Speaking to Ben Foster's Fozcast podcast , he spoke candidly about the physical demands constantly increasing and every weekend as he battles it out with yet another world-class young attacker.
The modern full-back, Smith believes, has one of the toughest jobs in football.
Action Images via Reuters / Craig Brough
"You've got to be quick, strong, intelligent, technically good. I mean, to play in this league, you have to be in every position. But fullback's tough, man."
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And the biggest difference he has noticed during his career is not necessarily the quality of the very best attackers, it is the fact that there are now so many of them.
When Adam Smith first established himself in the Premier League, he felt that facing a dangerous winger was more associated with the traditional top-six clubs, but that has changed...
"When I first started in the Prem, I would say - against the top six teams, I was coming against a good winger, and I knew I'd be in for a game. But nowadays, like I just said, it is every team that has got a top winger."
And it is not even just the player who starts the match...
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"It ain't just the winger that's starting, it's got the ones that come on as well. It is relentless", he continued.
REUTERS / Toby Melville
Smith was then asked the question every experienced defender will understand: what goes through his mind when, late in a game, he sees a fresh young attacker preparing to come on, and his answer was wonderfully honest.
"Well, I'm just like, please go on to the right or something, you know? It's horrible. It's a horrible feeling."
The problem becomes even greater if Bournemouth are trying to protect a lead, something which Bournemouth have failed to do after being in front four times out of five matches this season.
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"Especially if you're winning as well. You get done and that. Yeah, it's tough. I'm not going to lie. Especially if you're older as well."
Foster summed it up as simply being the reality of the modern day Premier League, and Smith agreed: "It's relentless, man. Physically, you just have to be a beast."
That relentless nature is perhaps what makes Smith's longevity so impressive. At 35, he is still competing at the highest level, having spent more than a decade in the Premier League and accumulated hundreds of appearances for Bournemouth. But he admits that longevity comes with a different psychological challenge.
Action Images via Reuters / Jason Cairnduff
He believes football has become increasingly obsessed with age, with players reaching their early thirties and suddenly being viewed differently.
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"You hit a certain age. Like, I think you hit 30, 31, everyone writes you off these days. So it's just constantly proving to everyone that you can still play at this level, you know?"
At this point, Smith suggests that, as every season brings another group of younger players determined to establish themselves, the experienced player has to relentlessly demonstrate that he can still handle the physical and technical demands.
And Smith's examples of the players he has faced this season demonstrate just how brutal that challenge can be. He rattled off a list including Antoine Semenyo, Bradley Barcola, Harvey Barnes, and Tyrique George before simply concluding: "honestly, it's relentless every game."
Whilst it seemed like Smith was referencing the toils of constantly being tested against these high-pressing attacking wingers, he explained that defending was just half the battle, because his position is no longer simply about dealing with the attackers, it's about being offensive yourself: "That's tough, mate. Inverted fullback."
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He explained that a modern full-back has to attack, defend, recover, run, combine, make decisions and cope with players who may be quicker than ever, and that means maintaining the physical capacity to contribute at both ends of the pitch. The evolution of the position has created tactical demands that Smith admits he finds difficult to imagine having dealt with earlier in his career.
REUTERS / Toby Melville
For an older defender, there is nowhere to hide.
Of course, Smith has played against some of the game's most difficult wingers, including Sadio Mané, Eden Hazard, Leroy Sané, Wilfried Zaha and Kaoru Mitoma, but asked which player gave him the biggest nightmare, he eventually settled on Mané: "He would press, like, he's strong, quick, could score."
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Smudge, naturallty, has dealt with the majority of them admirably - and perhaps that is why Bournemouth supporters are so lucky to have Adam Smith. In an era where experience can sometimes be overlooked in favour of youth, Smith continues to prove just how valuable a senior player can be - battling against the Premier League's best, guiding the next generation and bringing a level of perspective that only comes from years at the top.
For a club that has grown so remarkably over the past 16 years, having someone like Smudge still around the dressing room is something Bournemouth fans should never take for granted.
Every season brings new players. Every opponent presents a different tactical problem. Every substitute bench can contain another young player capable of changing a game, and for an older footballer, the challenge is not simply surviving against the next generation - it is continually proving that you still belong among them.
As Smith put it so simply: "You just have to be a beast."
