David de Gea : More than a Goalkeeper

Forget the Rumors, this is my theatre, this is my stage, this is my home

Those were the words of David de Gea Quintana as I watched the Announcement video of his new contract on the club’s official twitter page. The Premier League has seen greats like Edwin Van der Sar, Peter Schmeichel & Petr Cech to name a few, all mesmerize us with their abilities, but can we really say they were all better Goalkeepers than David?

On 29th June 2011, After widespread speculations & negotiations, Manchester United announced they’ve snapped up the Long term successor to Edwin van der Sar, a 20 year old kid from the city of Madrid. Sir Alex had finally gotten his man. He arrived as one of the best young prospects in European football & 8 years later we can stand with our heads held high that we’ve seen the extraordinary limits a Goalkeeper can reach at the highest level. This brings me back to my stance on him being the best in Premier league history.

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He’s been in squads that’s been top two of the Premier League thrice. First was In 2012, A Kun Aguero goal was the difference as the Abu Dhabi backed club won it’s maiden Premier league title, Second was in Sir Alex Ferguson’s Title winning last season at the club & third was under the great Jose Mourinho, though the latter finished a whopping 19 points behind City, which still is the highest points we’ve amassed in the post-Fergie era. This means that he’s actually been in struggling squads for 5 of his 8 years & counting Manchester United Career.

Majority of the great Premier league Goalkeepers before him boast of being part of multiple Title winning sides. Schmeichel was the Rock of the 1999 treble winning team, Cech marked the beginning of the Roman Abramovich era winning two titles on the spin under Jose Mourinho, Van der Sar was the mainstay as Sir Alex won the league thrice in a row between 2007 & 2009. But one difference is they all had great players marshaling their backline. Since Vidic & Ferdinand departed in 2014, De gea has most times been the reason we keep the faith when tough games go against us, be it a Big or Small opposition, playing in goal behind Terry, Carvalho, Stam, Neville, Vidic & Ferdinand is a whole new level compared to watching Phil Jones lose his cool while under pressure from Jon Walters.

The fact that he’s been voted by fellow professionals as the best Goalkeeper in the league for four years on the trot between the 2014-15 & 2017-18 seasons despite not winning a League title in that period is enough evidence of his greatness.

In 2018, he became the first ever goalkeeper plying his trade in England to be voted by Professional players as the best Goalkeeper on the planet, in a season he recorded 14 saves at the Emirates stadium. A record for a goalkeeper in the top flight. The next season he made 11 saves to keep Spurs off the scoresheet, the second most saves in a match, another record.

I thought they said the boy was struggling

Liverpool Icon, Kenny Dalglish joking in the Press conference room after a 1-1 draw with Manchester United at Anfield, 2011.

In a time when this great club we all love is at its lowest since we were deemed “Too good to go down”, a time when Elite players become skeptical about joining us when we are linked with them in the transfer market, a time when we’ve practically become what we called clubs like Arsenal in the past ‘Banter club’ all because of the way the club Is run by the Glazer family. David de Gea has ignored all that & called the Theatre of dreams his home & for that I’m immensely grateful.

Our only Genuinely World class player, our Talisman, the one we look up to when we need to see out a crazy game. Should he see out his contract till 2023, he’ll almost be 33 & would have given us 12 years of Unparalleled show of Professionalism.

Not bad for someone so “desperate to join Real Madrid”.