Shane's rate of development left Simeone genuinely astounded.
Though Simeone didn't overanalyze it. He simply credited his own limited knowledge of the player beforehand, and the natural reality that Shane had probably experienced a sudden breakthrough in technical understanding.
Seventeen and eighteen-year-olds were like that.
A single match could transform them. They were in the most explosive phase of physical and mental growth a footballer ever experienced.
With the Villarreal match comfortably behind them, Atlético's next fixture was an away trip to face Real Sociedad.
Traveling to the Basque Country to face the San Sebastián side was never going to be easy.
The Basques were simply built differently. They were the fighting peoples of the Iberian Peninsula.
Whether it was Real Sociedad or Athletic Bilbao, neither club rolled over for anyone.
Real Sociedad had endured a brutal start to the season. The stumbling campaign had at one point dragged them deep into the relegation zone.
By Matchday 13, they had scraped together only six points, sitting dead last in La Liga.
At that stage, almost every pundit in Spain had written them off for the drop.
But under the gradual tactical adjustments of French manager Philippe Montanier, the Basques had steadily rediscovered their identity.
From Matchday 13 through Matchday 19, they went undefeated across seven matches: four wins and three draws.
Their points tally climbed from a desperate six all the way to twenty-one, and their league position rose from the bottom of the table to a far more comfortable fifteenth.
The engine of this revival was their young French forward, Antoine Griezmann.
In those seven fixtures, the teenager had scored five goals and registered three assists.
A genuinely electrifying run of form.
As a graduate of the Real Sociedad academy, Griezmann was already the undisputed darling of Anoeta.
When the two teams emerged from the tunnel and Griezmann's face appeared on the stadium's giant screens...
The eruption of noise was so violent that Shane had to physically press a hand against his ear.
Almost instantly...
The broadcast camera pivoted and locked onto him.
And the stadium's deafening roar seamlessly transformed into a sharp, vicious wall of boos.
Shane simply pursed his lips.
"The defining subplot of this match will undoubtedly be the head-to-head battle between these two exceptional young talents!" García announced excitedly from the booth. "Both of them have established themselves as the offensive heartbeat of their respective clubs!"
"And Griezmann's recent form has been truly spectacular!"
...
Real Sociedad pushed aggressively from the first whistle, playing with the energy and confidence of a team that had found its rhythm.
Despite sitting in the lower half of the table, their style of play carried none of the caution of a relegation side.
Manager Montanier had instilled a clearly recognizable footballing identity into the team: emphasis on controlled possession, rhythm manipulation in the midfield, and building attacks through patient, technically precise combination play.
Then again, this was La Liga in 2012.
You would struggle to find many sides in Spain that fundamentally abandoned beautiful football in favor of bunkering deep with ten men and hoping a striker nicked a scrappy winner.
The Iberian Peninsula's footballing soul was inherently artistic.
And Griezmann was burning white hot.
His movement across the frontline was causing Atlético Madrid's defenders genuine, consistent discomfort.
In the sixteenth minute, Griezmann drifted out to the right channel, received a pass, and immediately read the body shape of left-back Filipe Luís. He spotted the window and exploded inward, cutting toward goal.
Filipe Luís reacted fractionally too late. Griezmann slipped past him.
Koke tracked back desperately, throwing his body across the cutting lane, just barely preventing the Frenchman from getting a clean shot away.
Forced off his original line, Griezmann switched instincts immediately. He drove his shoulder into Koke's body, going down inside the penalty area, drawing the foul.
"Oh! Griezmann! He has been an absolute menace to every Atlético defender on this pitch today!" the commentator exclaimed. "Look at how ragged Koke looks! A fraction of a second slower and Griezmann would have been inside the box clean through!"
Griezmann climbed to his feet.
The entire stadium was chanting his name.
The young Frenchman glanced briefly toward Shane, who was standing not far away.
Thus far into the match, Shane had been almost completely anonymous.
That left Griezmann mildly disappointed.
Before kickoff, his manager had spent the entire pre-match briefing relentlessly emphasizing, over and over, exactly what they could not allow Shane to do.
It had practically put his ears to sleep.
Griezmann picked up the ball and placed it at the foul location, rolling his eyes.
As Real Sociedad's designated set-piece specialist, he would take the free kick himself.
Griezmann studied the Atlético goal.
Thibaut Courtois was behind his wall, arms extended wide, organizing his defenders.
Shane, Gabi, and several others had formed the defensive wall.
Atlético had assembled five players to block the kick.
Griezmann had already scored a direct free kick earlier in the season, so the Atlético coaching staff were taking absolutely no chances.
"Griezmann steps up for this free kick. The position is excellent—just to the right of the top of the penalty arc. A natural left-footed curler from this angle can easily bend the ball around the wall toward the far corner..."
The commentator was still speaking as the referee blew his whistle.
Griezmann took his short run-up and struck.
The ball curled around the outside of the wall in a wide, sweeping arc, bending viciously as it reached its destination, arrowing into the far bottom corner.
Courtois didn't even get close to it.
"OH! GRIEZMANN! GRIEZMANN! BEAUTIFUL! WHAT A GOAL!"
"That curve on the ball! Outrageous! That is a worldie!"
The commentary booth erupted. The stadium detonated.
The Anoeta PA system boomed over the noise.
"In the seventeenth minute... scoring for Real Sociedad..."
"Antoine..."
"GRIEZMANN!!!"
The fans swung their arms forward in a perfectly synchronized wave, screaming his name at the top of their lungs.
The goal scorer sprinted to the corner flag, spreading his arms wide, leaping onto the advertising boards as Real Sociedad supporters pushed toward the railing.
"Antoine! Antoine! You are the best player on this pitch!"
"You are miles better than that American!"
The chants were so deliberate and so unified that television audiences watching at home could hear every word clearly.
And even if they couldn't read lips, the broadcast director was very skilled at telling stories with the camera.
The feed immediately cut to a tight close-up of Shane Carter.
"Before kickoff, the Spanish press had been heavily hyping the clash between these two young stars as the defining duel of the match..." the ESPN commentator said, his brow creasing slightly.
"Griezmann has just drawn first blood. Can Carter respond?"
Right on cue...
The broadcast cut to Shane's close-up.
He was standing near the center circle, hands on his hips, head turning slowly to watch the Real Sociedad players celebrate.
His expression betrayed absolutely nothing.
He simply looked like a man who had just watched someone else score in a game he was already thinking three moves ahead of.
Down in the live match chat, the reaction was immediate:
"Carter doesn't even need to panic over one goal"
"This is called composure. Learn it."
"It's just one goal, relax"
"He has barely even touched the ball yet. He is saving himself."
"Carter hasn't even started yet, bro. Watch."
"Don't worry. The man hasn't shifted into second gear."
The fans were not sweating.
Not even slightly.