It’s mad how many goalkeepers we’ve had deemed ‘not good enough’ by supporters. In my lifetime, only Pears, Schwarzer, Given and Randolph have been considered ‘good enough’ to be our No1. But Pears and Schwarzer were both still heavily criticised - both for their kicking more than anything else.
Maybe this is just what goalkeepers are. Every single one will make a mistake, drop a cross, give the ball away, be beaten at his near post, fumble one into the bottom corner. The ones who make the fewest errors play for the biggest, wealthiest clubs already. Some are obviously much better than others but Steffen is a perfectly good goalkeeper for Boro. In fact he’s a very good goalkeeper for us.
I might get pelters for this but I think the merits of goalkeeping is probably the most ill-informed discussion in football. Even more than officiating. It’s a specialist position and there are so few goalkeepers employed by the media to talk specifically about it. There was an interview with Buffon a few years back where he said the discourse around goalkeeping was and is just completely laughable. And I’d be inclined to agree.
Zack Steffen? I’d sign him to tomorrow if it was up to me. He’s been very good for us across the piece.
