'Calm when everything around you is on fire': how goalkeepers win titles

Goalkeepers are getting more analysis and airtime off the pitch. Good. They are the most important player on the grass when it comes to winning titles, opines Tim Ellis.

There’s a famous line from six-time world snooker champion Steve Davis that goes something like this: the best chance of success is to play as if it means nothing when it really means everything.

In professional sport, that ability to play with certainty, without fear of consequence, is the biggest weapon when the pressure of silverware comes into view.

Goalkeepers know that the buck and the ball stops and starts with them. When Stefan Ortega won the one-to-one against Son Heung-min with minutes remaining in the penultimate game of the 2023/24 season, Pep Guardiola was clear. 'He saves us - otherwise Arsenal are champions. That is the reality. The margins are so tight. The save from Son. It was incredible.'

Stefan Ortega made three crucial saves in his 21-minute cameo against Tottenham.

Including a one-on-one with Son.

Man City's saviour 👏 pic.twitter.com/iJC9VWULVm
— ESPN UK (@ESPNUK) May 14, 2024

The picture of Guardiola in complete angst, collapsed on his back, as Son ran through, is still a vivid reminder of the living agony of fine margins. Goalkeepers have cojones in spades.

'Every player and manager is nervous. It doesn't matter how much you make out you're not, you are. We are going to fight to the death, because we've got bottle.' These were the words of Blackburn’s Tim Flowers in the home straight of their battle with Manchester United in 1994/95. Gianluigi Buffon also believes in 'the right kind of fear'. What counts is the courage to beat it.

Flowers was letting off steam after a superb performance in a squeaky bum 1-0 win over Newcastle United. He had kept it together on the pitch where it counts. The training tools and repetition kicked in. Ortega knew what to do in the moment too. Everything else was external noise.

Stefan Ortega on his save vs Tottenham: "This is what I do every day. It's not a surprise for me. The only thing is the surroundings on the night, massive. That's why the save is that big. But for me this is what I do every day..." [via @_joebray]https://t.co/Srz2IZIExt
— City Xtra (@City_Xtra) August 8, 2024

“When it comes to stress and performing, you fall back on your training habits and application. If you train at 100% day in day out right until the end of sessions, then when the big moments come, and it’s late in the game, you can perform and execute your skills,” Andy Elleray, Coventry’s Lead Academy Goalkeeping Coach, told me.

As Arsenal and Manchester City come hurtling towards the business end of the fight, there has been a lot of emphasis on David Raya and Gianluigi Donnarumma. It’s almost as if football has realised that there’s just as much value in a goalkeeper duel than the normal obsession with the middle or top end of the pitch.

Finally, the real movie stars this season have been between the posts. Sky Sports dedicated a whole section of their Monday Night Football show to the duo’s relative merits in late February, using Goalkeeper.com xG data. It would have been an education to the uninitiated about what the untrained eye doesn’t see.

The highlights package is full. Donnarumma’s incredible save from Alexis Mac Allister at Anfield was a freeze-frame moment. A sharp stop with virtually the last kick of the game from Harvey Barnes went under the radar. Raya’s expert tip around the post against Chelsea in the dying minutes and his athleticism to stick out a leg to deny Everton’s Beto was a crucial intervention before Max Dowman stole the show reel.

That’s okay. Goalkeepers are used to playing second fiddle in the first-class lounge. Their intrinsic value is steadily becoming more public.

“The best train relentlessly for single moments in the game and can execute actions under pressure - thinking clearly around chaos or making the right decision at the right time. Being alert throughout the game and staying connected to the game duration is paramount as well,” says Elleray.

It helps when there are more empathetic voices on the ground to elaborate on the day job. Joe Hart and Shay Given are such regulars now across broadcasts that the nuances of the role do not go unnoticed.

Hart spoke of James Trafford’s 'absolute calmness' in City’s 2-0 win over the Gunners in the Carabao Cup final. There was a cleanness to his kicking and movements that followed an early eye-catching triple save. Hart also suggested that we must never feel sorry for a goalkeeper, because it’s a 'life they have chosen'.

Brutal honesty and a tacit admittance that the goalkeepers' union’s true grit has to be made of granite. It was good to see Donnarumma and Trafford commiserate with a crestfallen Kepa in a way that only a union can.

“Having ex-professionals help to myth-bust and give their first-hand perspective is helpful to the viewer. The role has become multi-faceted, that often expectations are unrealistic in terms of what they can produce - or clubs wanting their goalkeepers (sometimes very young) to be capable of doing everything,” Elleray tells me.

It’s not just about the saves. That’s the easy peak for TV entertainment and constant replays. Peter Schemichel recently spoke about the calming effect of Senne Lammens on the defence, and how everything has always started from the goalkeeper. There’s the challenge of beating a press, but the temperament and rhythm of the whole team is conducted by the backstop.

“I think the value of the goalkeeper in terms of how a team plays is becoming so important - if you look at transfer prices going through the roof and the scouting detail for goalkeepers - clubs are really aware of the necessity to have not only the best number one but the right one. You don’t usually see a team win anything meaningful without that,” says Elleray.

Buffon read it best when he said that goalkeepers have the job of 'giving calm when everything around you is on fire.' Firefighters never emerge unscathed from their jobs. They will wear the scars, but it won’t wear them down. As Hart said, it’s the job they chose.

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Calm when things are on fire: how goalkeepers win titles