[Classical Mechanic]

While he is not our biggest issue, I believe that he is still the highest paid GK in the world but his performances don't reflect this.

I noticed that he'd fallen behind Sa in the shotstopping stats. Looks like the only thing he's good at has fallen off a cliff in the run in.

 

[sullydnl]

While he is not our biggest issue, I believe that he is still the highest paid GK in the world but his performances don't reflect this.

Tbf that sort of pattern is what I'd have expected to see, I wouldn't criticise him for the drop-off.

His initial shot-stopping form was unsustainably high (significantly higher than even his previous best) so there was always going to be regression. Which indeed was one of the problems with people projecting ahead with that form in mind. If his peak form had continued he would have saved us something like 20 goals across the season through shot-stopping alone, which obviously wasn't going to happen. And goalkeepers generally tend not to sustain the same level across whole seasons anyway, those fluxes are normal.

Across the season he still ranks third best per 90 in the league and 6th best across the big five leagues, so it remains the case that he's performed as a high level shot stopper this season. It's literally every other part of his game that's the problem.

 

[Red For Ever]

It looks like we have a shortlist of New Keepers being looked at


United Scouts have researched 804 new Keepers to replace De Gea

 

[CloneMC16]

Yeah, he is only performing well in the sense that he isn't chucking the ball into his net like he was during the previous few years. His general shot stopping has returned to an acceptable standard, but even then, it's only specific type of shots that he excels at. Anything that requires any form of bravey, physical contact or rushing out to make a chance more difficult for an attacker and he is utterly hopeless at it. I remember various goals we have conceded this season where he was an embarrassment.

I often see him criticised for not being able to do certain things that are perceived as 'modern goalkeeping'. However, he also lacks basic fundamentals that have always been essential for a goalkeeper.

This is very bad and something that doesn't get mentioned much. He avoids any kind of physical contact if he possibly can. He won't put his body on the line like a lot of other keepers would. He is so afraid of it. The best paid keeper in the world has so many flaws.

 

[Swiss_Red89]

I respect him and appreciate what he has done for us, but I would start to repalce him. Even if it is with Henderson. Our defence seemed overall more assured with Henderson in goal last season than it has been all season this year, with Big Dave in goal.

We won't buying a new keeper this summer, so I would give Hendo a go at the start of next season.

 

[ThehatchetMan]

Really hope we can offload him and get a fee for him this summer.

While his performances have improved this season, let’s not forget just how accountable he is for a lot of things over the last few seasons.

Believe he went near 40 penalties in a row without saving one. Cost us the Europa League final. Cost us champions league qualification a few seasons back. And statistically compared to other GK in the league he is very average.

Every so often he goes through a spell of decent form but he’s just not good enough on the whole in my opinion for a player taking home near 400k a week.

I’ve noticed as well this season in his interviews he’s began to become very critical of his team mates which I don’t like either. Because David himself is on ludicrous wages and is individually responsible for a lot of issues too and none of the other players ever pointed the finger at him.

Not been the same player since Euro 2016 (or WC 2018?). Get rid.

 

[Tavern in the town]

Wins our player of the year again. Surely someone at the club has spotted the trend of him looking like a top keeper when we’re shite and him looking like a shite keeper when we’re playing reasonably well.

 

[acnumber9]

Wins our player of the year again. Surely someone at the club has spotted the trend of him looking like a top keeper when we’re shite and him looking like a shite keeper when we’re playing reasonably well.

He was our player of the year in 17/18. The season where we gathered the most points in the period after Alex Ferguson retired.

 

[Tavern in the town]

He was our player of the year in 17/18. The season where we gathered the most points in the period after Alex Ferguson retired.

A season we were utter shite and underlying metrics had us as the 6th best team in the league. Wonder where we finished the next season when our luck ran out.

 

[acnumber9]

A season we were utter shite and underlying metrics had us as the 6th best team in the league. Wonder where we finished the next season when our luck ran out.

Or we won more points than we should’ve because our keeper played out of his skin. If the correlation you’re suggesting was present we would’ve been good the season his form dropped. It was the opposite.

 

[Tavern in the town]

Or we won more points than we should’ve because our keeper played out of his skin. If the correlation you’re suggesting was present we would’ve been good the season his form dropped. It was the opposite.

I’m not saying him playing well makes us play bad. I’m saying us playing shite makes him play well. And when we’re better he’s shite because he isn’t suited to a team that dominates games.

 

[acnumber9]

I’m not saying him playing well makes us play bad. I’m saying us playing shite makes him play well. And when we’re better he’s shite because he isn’t suited to a team that dominates games.

You mean that a team playing shite may lead to a keeper having more work to do? I’m not sure that requires deep analysis. Regardless, I’m not sure I would call what happened the two seasons before this dominating games.

 

[No Idea For Nickname]

 

[Remember the geese]

Delusion.

 

[Oranges038]

Someone should send him a framed picture of that Arsenal goal as a memento of his great season. He can hang it on his wall, somewhere he can admire it every day.

 

[sullydnl]

Quite right too.

He finished last season being pilloried after the UEFA Cup final and it seemed almost certain he would be replaced as United's #1 by Henderson this season. But he came back to pre-season early, put the extra work in, regained his #1 spot, contributed what was certainly the highest level of performance he'd managed since the 17/18 season, will quite likely be our POTY and will quite likely start next season as our #1 again.

It's right that he should take pride in managing to pull his career back on track to that extent from a point where he looked absolutely shot. Aside from anything else, it takes remarkable mental strength to work through that sort of sustained criticism.

Of course it doesn't change anything in terms of his fundamental flaws or all the reasons he needs to be replaced relatively soon. But it would take either an absence of empathy or an abundance of stupidity not to appreciate why he'd feel he'd done well this season.

Similarly, it's easy to see why someone like Ronaldo might be pleased to have returned 18 PL goals as a 36/37 year old even in the context of an overall shit season. It doesn't change the downsides and problems he brings either but players should be allowed to benchmark their personal performances against what they're actually capable of rather than what fans want some other player to come in and do instead.

 

[Lee565]

His shot stopping ability is extremely overrated, he benefits massively from the teams awful defending as the law of average means he gets to pull a lot more saves that result in two or three eye catching ones and get's off the hook from his awful ball distribution. I see the likes of pope for Burnley in a similar situation of facing a barrage of shots every game and pulling of the same 3 or 4 outstanding saves per game like the so called world class shot stopping de gea except pope is actually better with his distribution and commanding the box.

De gea is a very lucky guy to be our number 1 during a awful period post fergie of being terribly mismanaged in terms of player and manager recruitment because had we recruited a progressive High class modern manager that likes to play on the front foot, he would not last more than a season and tbh unless ten hag gets pressured to play him because of his overinflated wages I don't see him finishing the season as number 1 as ten hag and coaching staff will become massively frustrated with him preventing them from getting the team to play how he will want them to

 

[acnumber9]

But it would take either an absence of empathy or an abundance of stupidity not to appreciate why he'd feel he'd done well this season.

Unfortunately there’s a lot of that going round.

 

[Based Adnan]

Can only think the guy doesn't recognize his shortcomings in coming off his line and ball playing if he's proud of his season

 

[Nero]

My keeper. Let them hate.

 

[JB7]

Yeah when you’re literally the worst goalkeeper in the league at critical aspects of your job you shouldn’t be proud of your season. People keep suggesting this clown as captain for next season, unimaginable, the standards he holds himself to are clearly a joke.

 

[klsv]

So glad we finally found out that our biggest issue is De Gea. Would be winning quadruples left and right if it wasn't for him.

 

[rbdoconnor]

People keep suggesting this clown as captain for next season, unimaginable, the standards he holds himself to are clearly a joke.

Clown? That's a bit much. Of course, he may not have met your standards as a gk, and he may not meet Ten Hag's. But he was getting a huge amount of criticism and made a number of important saves this season. Sure, he made some errors, but he must have put the effort in to overcome this, which as other posters said takes a huge amount of mental strength.

Just because you're a fan of united doesn't give you a god given right to insult our players.

 

[CloneMC16]

Yeah when you’re literally the worst goalkeeper in the league at critical aspects of your job you shouldn’t be proud of your season. People keep suggesting this clown as captain for next season, unimaginable, the standards he holds himself to are clearly a joke.

Willing to bet a lot of our players are like this. They think they're good players and blame the rest of the team for our poor performances.

 

[Dante]

He wasn't actually that good this season. His xG against was 56.5 and he conceded 56. So we're only half a goal better off. And this is the best paid goalkeeper in the world.

He seems to get excused thanks to a handful of showy moments despite overall ineffectual performances, in the same way an 20 year old from the academy might. It seems to be only DDG and Elanga that can get away with it.

 

[Chicharo]

So glad we finally found out that our biggest issue is De Gea. Would be winning quadruples left and right if it wasn't for him.

Good old CAF!

 

[sullydnl]

He wasn't actually that good this season. His xG against was 56.5 and he conceded 56. So we're only half a goal better off. And this is the best paid goalkeeper in the world.

He seems to get excused thanks to a handful of showy moments despite overall ineffectual performances, in the same way an 20 year old from the academy might. It seems to be only DDG and Elanga that can get away with it.

Post-shot xG is generally accepted as the better way of assessing goalkeeper performances and he's +6.8 in that regard, second best in the league and fifth best across the big 5 leagues.

He has plenty of other flaws but his shot-stopping has been excellent.

 

[NewYorkRed]

Yeah when you’re literally the worst goalkeeper in the league at critical aspects of your job you shouldn’t be proud of your season. People keep suggesting this clown as captain for next season, unimaginable, the standards he holds himself to are clearly a joke.

You’re an embarrassment to ManUtd fans everywhere. You don’t think he’s good? Ok fine. We can disagree but everyone is entitled to an opinion. To call one of the club’s best keepers of all time a clown? Idiotic.

 

[Dante]

Post-shot xG is generally accepted as the better way of assessing goalkeeper performances and he's +6.8 in that regard, second best in the league and fifth best across the big 5 leagues.

He has plenty of other flaws but his shot-stopping has been excellent.

Thanks. That wasn't a metric I'd seen before.

That said, I looked it up on FBref did a quick bit of Excel manipulation to account for the number of shots each 'keeper faced. If you work out the PSxG for each shot on target and then compare that to the GA for each shot on target, this is the table of data that comes out:

Spoiler

Rank	Play	PSxG	GA	SoT	PSxG/SoT	GA/SoT	PSxG/SoT - GA/SoT
1	Mike Maignan	27.1​	21​	98​	0.277​	0.214​	0.062​
2	José Sá	47.8​	39​	148​	0.323​	0.264​	0.059​
3	Yassine Bounou	29​	24​	98​	0.296​	0.245​	0.051​
4	Édgar Badía	40.1​	35​	106​	0.378​	0.330​	0.048​
5	Walter Benítez	39.3​	33​	134​	0.293​	0.246​	0.047​
6	Manuel Riemann	51.7​	45​	149​	0.347​	0.302​	0.045​
7	Thibaut Courtois	34​	29​	116​	0.293​	0.250​	0.043​
8	David Ospina	29.2​	25​	104​	0.281​	0.240​	0.040​
9	Matías Dituro	45.8​	41​	125​	0.366​	0.328​	0.038​
10	Martin Dúbravka	37.5​	34​	102​	0.368​	0.333​	0.034​
11	Stefan Ortega	58.4​	53​	172​	0.340​	0.308​	0.031​
12	Wojciech Szczęsny	32.1​	29​	101​	0.318​	0.287​	0.031​
13	Alisson	25.8​	23​	92​	0.280​	0.250​	0.030​
14	Álex Remiro	33.1​	30​	102​	0.325​	0.294​	0.030​
15	Pau López	31.3​	29​	81​	0.386​	0.358​	0.028​
16	Niki Mäenpää	29​	27​	71​	0.408​	0.380​	0.028​
17	Luís Maximiano	58​	54​	165​	0.352​	0.327​	0.024​
18	Yann Sommer	64​	60​	175​	0.366​	0.343​	0.023​
19	David de Gea	59.8​	56​	174​	0.344​	0.322​	0.022​
20	Alexander Nübel	40.7​	38​	125​	0.326​	0.304​	0.022​
21	Nick Pope	47.9​	45​	154​	0.311​	0.292​	0.019​
22	Łukasz Fabiański	49.8​	47​	149​	0.334​	0.315​	0.019​
23	Stole Dimitrievski	38.9​	37​	116​	0.335​	0.319​	0.016​
24	Rui Silva	22​	21​	72​	0.306​	0.292​	0.014​
25	Marc-Aurèle Caillard	26​	25​	74​	0.351​	0.338​	0.014​

DDG doesn't come out of this quite as badly as I thought in my earlier post. Though he's still only the 19th best 'keeper in Europe's top 5 leagues, and the 4th best in the Premier League.

 

[::sonny::]

Ot even in Spanish squad

 

[charlenefan]

 

[bosnian_red]

Love it de Gea. Rip into them.

 

[tentan]

He needs to go too.

 

[JB7]

You’re an embarrassment to ManUtd fans everywhere. You don’t think he’s good? Ok fine. We can disagree but everyone is entitled to an opinion. To call one of the club’s best keepers of all time a clown? Idiotic.

Yeah I’ll be an embarrassment to United fans everywhere on the train back from Palace after spending god knows how much following the team all over Europe again this year because I called a player a clown. I can’t even begin to imagine the dogs abuse some of the others get in their respective performance topics (Maguire anyone?) but calling a guy who’s happy with being shite at most areas of his job a clown on the interview makes me the embarrassment. You carry on rimming the guy from New York I’m sure that’s a lot more help. By the way he’s not even one of the best keepers of my lifetime, let alone all time. He appears to have given a good interview today though, I’ll give him that.

 

[NewYorkRed]

Yeah I’ll be an embarrassment to United fans everywhere on the train back from Palace after spending god knows how much following the team all over Europe again this year because I called a player a clown. I can’t even begin to imagine the dogs abuse some of the others get in their respective performance topics (Maguire anyone?) but calling a guy who’s happy with being shite at most areas of his job a clown on the interview makes me the embarrassment. You carry on rimming the guy from New York I’m sure that’s a lot more help. By the way he’s not even one of the best keepers of my lifetime, let alone all time. He appears to have given a good interview today though, I’ll give him that.

You think you’re better than me because you spend money to go to away games? I spent an arm and a leg to fly to England in december just to watch the team play so you can get outta here with that nonsense.

And yeah, you’re an idiot. And an embarrassment to United supporters. Don’t care how many games you’ve been too,your attitude and comments suck.

 

[Red00012]

Delusion.

He was our player of our season.

 

[JB7]

You think you’re better than me because you spend money to go to away games? I spent an arm and a leg to fly to England in december just to watch the team play so you can get outta here with that nonsense.

And yeah, you’re an idiot. And an embarrassment to United supporters. Don’t care how many games you’ve been too,your attitude and comments suck.

Well done you. I don’t think I’m better than anyone but if you’re happy with his mentality of being happy with a season where he is statistically the worst keeper in the league in critical areas of his game then you & him can be clowns together. All the best.

 

[Remember the geese]

He was our player of our season.

Good shot stopper, but that's far from good enough. He either becomes more rounded, or he leaves. That simple for me.

 

[Big Ben Foster]

He was our player of our season.

Statistically he was very poor in the second half of the season

 

[R'hllor]

Love how there are now attempts to separate themselfs from the rest, we are not like them bullshit, please, good characters he said. Bet he misses the days when he was crying on airport because he had to return back to Manchester due fax machine going bust, at least he was wanted then.