How much of a priority is upgrading our goalkeeper?

Grylte said:
Midfield and attack needs to be sorted first, they are worse than the GK situation.
After that it's a toss up between RB and GK for me.

No clue what good keepers are out there, though.
Click to expand...

From within the PL we've probably just faced the best two options in Sanchez and Raya. Outside the PL, I've no idea.

It was mentioned in The Athletic that Leeds' Meslier was being looked at as a potential long term replacement for De Gea but I don't think he's ready for the step up yet.
 
NewYorkRed said:
I’ve defended him for a long time, and I will admit its getting harder and harder to do so, but I am still willing to give him one last chance. Not least because there are about 5 players who deserve to go before he does.
Click to expand...

Giving more chances and falling into the same old traps is what gets us where we are now. Apparently, for most of the caf, no player on the market is "United quality" but we are somehow ready to blind our eyes and forgive bad performances every week.

Standards were there once and now we accept mediocrity - woeful performances somehow vanish with social media apologies, we will stick together and that kind of stuff we are hearing the last couple of years and the same players start every week again.

Enough of this. No matter how long are you at the club, are you an academy player or not or you were crucial to the squad in past - if you stop performing consistently, and I don't mean to be consistently bad, you should face consequences. When there is none, and players get into starting lineup after this kind of performance we can't expect things to be suddenly better.
 
RDCR07 said:
Not as much as our attack, midfield and defense need upgrading.
Click to expand...
Eyes firmly closed. We could have Ferdinand and Vidic and they would both look shite with this iteration of De Gea behind them. He’s a complete liability and I’ve maintained that for 4 years. It’s only getting worse but sure let’s pretend he’s not a massive issue.
 
Obviously we all knew his issues with sweeping, claiming, passing, etc. But I had thought his shot-stopping might be enough to hold off on him being a problem that needed replacing within this very first transfer window.

His first two games were alarming in that regard. Because while all the weaknesses we expect were still there, he's also made mistakes in terms of his handling, concentration and decision making that weren't necessarily a given. That has raised the issue higher in the list of priorities to my mind, because I'm now worried we won't even get the mitigation of high shot-stopping performance from him. And without that, we are beyond fecked with him in goal.
 
sullydnl said:
From within the PL we've probably just faced the best two options in Sanchez and Raya. Outside the PL, I've no idea.

It was mentioned in The Athletic that Leeds' Meslier was being looked at as a potential long term replacement for De Gea but I don't think he's ready for the step up yet.
Click to expand...
Meslier would be my top choice. The nerve he has shown to play in GK for Leeds at such a young age is impressive given the style that Leeds play and how exposed he is.

He has made a lot of mistakes these past seasons, but he looks the better of them the more I see him, rather than wilting away under the scrutiny.

Midfield and striker are positions we desperately need to sort. That shambles from De Gea was not something we needed two weeks into the PL.
 
AndySmith1990 said:
It's a priority but I don't know whether it's priority #1 or priority #5 there are that many areas to improve. But if you think about it in terms of wage vs value to the team, he's probably the shittest player in the squad, even ahead of Ronaldo. To think we're paying not far off a million per week for the pair of them. That's probably more than what the entire Brentford first team are earning
Click to expand...

Certainly in the top 3 after yesterday
 
There's nothing more important, if players don't have confidence in the keeper it impacts everything they do.
 
Why do we need to buy a new GK, can't we recall Henderson?, and next year look for better option.
 
We will struggle this season once again with him in goal. Even Maguire would probably look a bit better if he had more confidence and belief in the player behind him. He makes a nervous energy run through the entire team and fanbase. You need a safe pair of hands, and in the modern game, safe feet, to be a keeper, he has neither.
 
The Athletic reporting again today that we're looking for competition for De Gea.
 
Why look at buying a new keeper when Henderson is a good all round modern keeper who talks to his defence, leaves his line and comes out of his area when needed, is a good shot stopper, good with his feet and is hungry to perform at as high a level as possible ?

Yes we could certainly upgrade on Henderson but it’d cost us £50 million when we need a right back, a centre back, a defensive midfielder, a deep lying playmaker, a left footed attacker AND a striker as well.

Is Henderson the long term answer ? Probably not BUT he is much better suited to an ETH system than De Gea will ever be at any point so why spend more money when we can let De Gea go next summer for free and tell Henderson he’ll be our number one next season when he returns then look at a back up to Henderson as well as Heaton.

I just don’t see the point in keep buying players instead of trying some of what we have, it’s like the reports I’ve seen non stop since yesterday about Garner leaving for £20 million when he’s far more suited to the deep role earmarked for De Jong than either McTominay or Fred whilst Laird has been loaned to QPR when he’s a better fit than Dalot or AWB and actually wants to play for us.

The reason Henderson was so fecking pissed with us was Ole had promised him a run and it didn’t happen as Ole was too scared to drop underperforming big names or try anything different due to his shortcomings as a coach, ETH and Henderson have apparently never spoken but you can bet your house that ETH will be watching Forest this year to check on him.
 
davidmichael said:
Why look at buying a new keeper when Henderson is a good all round modern keeper who talks to his defence, leaves his line and comes out of his area when needed, is a good shot stopper, good with his feet and is hungry to perform at as high a level as possible ?

Yes we could certainly upgrade on Henderson but it’d cost us £50 million when we need a right back, a centre back, a defensive midfielder, a deep lying playmaker, a left footed attacker AND a striker as well.

Is Henderson the long term answer ? Probably not BUT he is much better suited to an ETH system than De Gea will ever be at any point so why spend more money when we can let De Gea go next summer for free and tell Henderson he’ll be our number one next season when he returns then look at a back up to Henderson as well as Heaton.

I just don’t see the point in keep buying players instead of trying some of what we have, it’s like the reports I’ve seen non stop since yesterday about Garner leaving for £20 million when he’s far more suited to the deep role earmarked for De Jong than either McTominay or Fred whilst Laird has been loaned to QPR when he’s a better fit than Dalot or AWB and actually wants to play for us.

The reason Henderson was so fecking pissed with us was Ole had promised him a run and it didn’t happen as Ole was too scared to drop underperforming big names or try anything different due to his shortcomings as a coach, ETH and Henderson have apparently never spoken but you can bet your house that ETH will be watching Forest this year to check on him.
Click to expand...
Sir Erik ten Hag said:
Henderson seems done with United already.
Click to expand...
 

How many United players over the past decade have been “done at the club” ? I can think of De Gea, AWB, Dalot, Lindelof, Bailly, Tuanzebe, Shaw, Telles, VDB, Fred, Martial and Rashford just from the ones that are in our squad right now still.

Other’s that have now left were meant to be leaving every year but didn’t too so I don’t ever buy anyone being done at our upside down club until they’re out the door outside of Ronaldo who’s done in his mind whether he stays or goes, if Henderson performs at Forest this year then I guarantee ETH will look at keeping him because it’s an area we don’t need to buy in then so we can focus on other areas.
 
DDG's salary is really close to KDB. i dont think we need to replace him as of yet (bigger priorities) but ffs.

DDG makes more money than:

Sterling, Coulibaly, Kante
Haaland, Grealish, Rodri
Salah VJD, Thiago.


And that is our issue. Who on their right state of mind offered a GK close to £20m i can't understand. Alison makes less than half. It's not just his performance. It's the Value for Money aspect.
 
Theo88 said:
DDG's salary is really close to KDB. i dont think we need to replace him as of yet (bigger priorities) but ffs.

DDG makes more money than:

Sterling, Coulibaly, Kante
Haaland, Grealish, Rodri
Salah VJD, Thiago.


And that is our issue. Who on their right state of mind offered a GK close to £20m i can't understand. Alison makes less than half. It's not just his performance. It's the Value for Money aspect.
Click to expand...

Yeah massively overpaid for a GK
 
This should be a top priority ahead of the Liverpool game. A keeper who is incapable of doing even the basics right is so damaging for the whole team, especially one lacking in confidence.

We have 5 subs available to try something new with any underperforming outfield players, even if the options aren't great. A goalkeeper is supposed to be the constant in the team, yet de Gea is one of our flakiest players and has been for quite a while. I really hope we can get creative and find a keeper who is capable of displacing him, even if they are brought in as 'competition'.
 
Wouldn't Keylor Navas be available on cheap? For sure he's a better option than De Gea.
 
TrustInJanuzaj said:
Eyes firmly closed. We could have Ferdinand and Vidic and they would both look shite with this iteration of De Gea behind them. He’s a complete liability and I’ve maintained that for 4 years. It’s only getting worse but sure let’s pretend he’s not a massive issue.
Click to expand...

To be fair we could have Allisson and he would suffer behind Maguire. Both need to be upgraded to match Ten Hags system.
 
gregor said:
Wouldn't Keylor Navas be available on cheap? For sure he's a better option than De Gea.
Click to expand...

He is a goalkeeper I always liked for Madrid more than Courtois.

I also like the Aston Villa ex Arsenal goalkeeper.
 
Yes, he is very high on the list, but higher still are in positions like CM, LW, FW, RB.

Erratum: On second thought there are two or three more positions.
 
TheLord said:
Yes, he is very high on the list, but higher still are in positions like CM, LW, FW, RB.

Erratum: On second thought there are two or three more positions.
Click to expand...

For me, just because there is much more of a gap in the squad when it comes to those positions - it doesn’t make it lower a priority of the waiting list.

If any manager comes and sorts out GK first then that gives me hope that we are building a team from the back to the front.

I believe De Gea has a heavy problematic influence on how our defenders play, and our defenders have an influence on the midfield, midfield on attack etc.

I was gutted when Henderson and even Romero went. They were much more all rounded goalkeepers.
 
Alongside DM it is the most pressing need in the team by far, especially with the way Ten Hag wants us to play. Those are two fundamental roles in us being able to play out from the back and dominate possession and we will continue to struggle until they're addressed. In addition to in possession qualities, a more commanding and proactive goalkeeper will also allow us to press more effectively and cover for Lisandro's lack of height at crosses and set pieces.

One thing that hasn't been particularly touched upon is his mental state which is obviously hard to judge from the outside but his comments on the weekend about not knowing how we can improve and last season about how he feels like we're cursed as a club indicate a severe lack of belief. Being part of the entire post SAF era from start to present has likely taken a toll on him and makes it even more imperative that he's replaced by a bigger character who can transmit confidence throughout the team.

If we bring in a number 2 who can pass a little bit I'm quite sure he'll have displaced de Gea by season's end.
 
Last edited:
We'll get it sorted next season , midfield should be the priority.

Shame how de gea degraded so massively after Fergie in this regard, he didn't seem to be that ball averse at first.

His saving grace has been a mess since 2018wc which seemingly broke him, im afraid a bad start is going to set the mood for the rest of the season as far as he's concerned but if that came to be, Heaton should be fine as a stop gap.
 
Not a priority at all!
Ralf raved about how good our GKs are and it looks like Erik is a fan of De Gea.
Nothing to see here.
 
If we're going to play a high line De Gea has to improve coming off his line and command the area beyond the six yard box better.

If he doesnt improve I say assuming we improve our midfield this transfer window.. Goalkeeper should be priority next summer.
 
I think it's one of our biggest priorities. DDG is a rubbish modern day keeper. Not even ahead of the Brighton and Brentford keepers now for Spain. He is shocking with his feet (except using them to save the ball), he is suspect with crosses and he's shocking coming off his line.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.