Alisson Becker

[Buzzo]

On evidence this season and last, Kelleher is a better ball playing keeper than Ali. I've never seen why people keep saying he's great with the ball at this feet... he just isn't. Don't get me wrong, he's better at it than the average keeper and he's no Mignolet or Adrian... but he's not a worldie with his feet. Far from it in my view. He's decent but there's always a few heart in mouth moments. He was much more solid with his ball control in his first season than he is now. He's been dreadful for months with his kicking.

It’s easy to post this now though. 2 weeks ago this just wasn’t the case, and last 2 seasons even less so. He was barely letting a goal in for massive periods over his first 2 seasons.

[Tribute]

It’s easy to post this now though. 2 weeks ago this just wasn’t the case, and last 2 seasons even less so. He was barely letting a goal in for massive periods over his first 2 seasons.

...my point isn't about his all round goalkeeping ability, it's about playing the ball out with his feet. He's an awesome shot stopper and reads the game (generally) very well. Just personally, with the ball at his feet I've never thought he was all that... outside of short passes to the defence, if he has to pass any distance, it invariably goes out of play or he slices it in the wrong direction.

[Norbs]

Ederson at City is a better ball playing keeper than him IMO, but Ali is the calmer and better all round keeper. Not saying Ali's not great with the ball, but I always thought his long range passing was not as good as his short range passing.

The first goal today, while a mistake, I feel with someone else in front of him other than Kabak, he'd have cleared that ball and we would not have been here discussing about him, as he's been excellent up to then.

First goal was a free kick wasn't it?

[Buzzo]

...my point isn't about his all round goalkeeping ability, it's about playing the ball out with his feet. He's an awesome shot stopper and reads the game (generally) very well. Just personally, with the ball at his feet I've never thought he was all that... outside of short passes to the defence, if he has to pass any distance, it invariably goes out of play or he slices it in the wrong direction.

I think he has been good, but, that’s an impossible point to defend right now. If we look at the similarities between us this season and city last, then Ederson was making a few costly errors, against Utd for example.

It is crucial we stick with him and let him rediscover his form.

Look at how assured Alisson was in the CL final for example. We were absolutely rock solid.

And another thing to consider, no keeper is going to find his rthym with an ever rotating set of Centre Backs in front of him.

[Fredo]

First goal was a free kick wasn't it?

I don’t know about the free kick. Was it before the ball was kicked towards Ali and Kabak?

[Doc_Piptorious]

On evidence this season and last, Kelleher is a better ball playing keeper than Ali. I've never seen why people keep saying he's great with the ball at this feet... he just isn't. Don't get me wrong, he's better at it than the average keeper and he's no Mignolet or Adrian... but he's not a worldie with his feet. Far from it in my view. He's decent but there's always a few heart in mouth moments. He was much more solid with his ball control in his first season than he is now. He's been dreadful for months with his kicking.

Kelleher's pass completion is at 71% for this season to date (all comps) and is at 75% for the PL. Last season he was scoring a bit lower than Adrian so his % this season is an improvement.


Adrian is at 65.6% in all comps. 67.3% for the PL.


Alisson is at 83.6% for all comps and 83.7% for the PL.



Second best in the UK top flight is Ederson with an 81.4% in both all comps and in the PL.


Did notice that a lot of the other keeprs that get lauded for being good with their feet all are only in the 65% to 75% accuracy range.

Alisson also keeps his 80% + average pretty much throughout his career and he scores amongst the highest in the game for accurate long passes and long throws as well.

Alisson's numbers are even more impressive considering he has to keep that average up over a greater number of games.


Very few top flight keepers in the game have a pass accuracy even close to that of Alisson and given that he maintains a high accuracy % for both long and short passes along with throws it puts him in the top 3 or 5 for using his feet.

Think only Neuer beats him as Neuer's numbers are 85.6% in all comps and 85.8% in the Bundesliga

[Exiled_red]

On the stats our GK passing stats (and those of City keepers) are almost certainly going to be higher than most teams in the league because we play alot more short passes out from the back than most other teams do which will skew the numbers somewhat. Of course having GKs that are decent with the ball at their feet is an important part of being able to play that way, but the fact that Alisson and Ederson top those stats is not at all surprising even taking into account a few horrendous errors

[Doc_Piptorious]

On the stats our GK passing stats (and those of City keepers) are almost certainly going to be higher than most teams in the league because we play alot more short passes out from the back than most other teams do which will skew the numbers somewhat. Of course having GKs that are decent with the ball at their feet is an important part of being able to play that way, but the fact that Alisson and Ederson top those stats is not at all surprising even taking into account a few horrendous errors

The thing with Alisson is he maintained a pretty high % for most of his career and with different clubs and for his country.

Plus the more difficult passing, long passes etc, he maintains a higher than average completion rate for too and again throughout his career. So even for us he has a much higher completion % for long passes and goal kicks than almost every other keeper in the league I say almost because I have not gone through every keeper, I just looked at all the ones with acombined pass completion % of 75 or higher and then looked at the break downs of long and short passing for them. Only guy that runs Alisson close with any of the pass stats I check is Ederson.

In fact you have to go back to when he was playing his club football in Brazil to find a more regular or average pass completion rate per season and when you dig into those stats you find that he was playing a huge amount of long balls back then as his team tended not to play out from the back, so for the number of long balls he was playing back then his accuracy was still way above average for distance passing.

When it comes to him playing for a European club, be it with Roma or Us, he has maintained pretty much a 80% plus average in all comps over a five year period, and for Brazil from Jan 2018 onwards his accuracy % is sitting at 88.2% from 22 games played (could not find stats for before 2018 for his national team)

Basically the guy is at an elite level for a goalkeeper when it comes to the ball at his feet and probably only has Neuer shading him over the past five years and Ederson sitting just behind him.

[spud_gun]

Basically the guy is at an elite level for a goalkeeper when it comes to the ball at his feet and probably only has Neuer shading him over the past five years and Ederson sitting just behind him.

Both of whom are also prone to mistakes.

Neuer vs us in the Champions League a few seasons back.

Ederson numerous occasions since he's been in the Premier League.

As you say Alisson is an elite level goalkeeper. The mistakes of the last two weeks won't change my mind on that.

If he's still making these mistakes in a few months time then there will be cause for concern.

Lets not underplay the impact of playing behind an unsettled backline will have had on him. I'm in no doubt he wouldn't have come charging out for that ball had Virgil being the one who was chasing it down.

[Angryred]

Both of whom are also prone to mistakes.

Neuer vs us in the Champions League a few seasons back.

Ederson numerous occasions since he's been in the Premier League.

As you say Alisson is an elite level goalkeeper. The mistakes of the last two weeks won't change my mind on that.

If he's still making these mistakes in a few months time then there will be cause for concern.

Lets not underplay the impact of playing behind an unsettled backline will have had on him. I'm in no doubt he wouldn't have come charging out for that ball had Virgil being the one who was chasing it down.

That was my argument with my brother the other day when he was raging on Alisson making mistakes for the 2nd game in a row.

[Doc_Piptorious]

Both of whom are also prone to mistakes.

Neuer vs us in the Champions League a few seasons back.

Ederson numerous occasions since he's been in the Premier League.

As you say Alisson is an elite level goalkeeper. The mistakes of the last two weeks won't change my mind on that.

If he's still making these mistakes in a few months time then there will be cause for concern.

Lets not underplay the impact of playing behind an unsettled backline will have had on him. I'm in no doubt he wouldn't have come charging out for that ball had Virgil being the one who was chasing it down.

Would put it as both make mistakes from time to time rather than saying both are prone to mistakes as the latter makes it sound like they both make a disproportionate number of mistakes that lead to either a goal or a clear cut goal scoring opportunity.

I am phrasing it that way as both Alisson and Neuer have racked up a very low number of errors and those nubers stay low regardless whether you look at them as bulk number or whether you take the numbers of errors in proportionate to the number of shots faced or passes made/received.

So in terms of error management both Neuer and Alisson stay pretty much at the top of the charts even when you equalize things by using shot and pass volumes versus errors made.

It basically is very difficult to make any case that stats Alisson is anything other than world class in his role as he scores high in pretty much every stat you can use for a keeper and he always scores exceptionally high when it come to the eye test as his positioning is generally freakishly good. If you wanted to get footage of almost text book positioning for a goalkeeper and what it looks like to the the then we again would be looking at Alisson and Neuer as probaly the two best examples of it in the game today with Jan Oblak also coming into the picture with those two when it comes to world class positioning over an extended period of time.

And that top rate positioning over such an extended period of time points to an exceptional level of in game concentration not to mention the work done behind the scenes in training.

For me Alisson is the best all round keeper in the game since Neuer pulled on gloves, and it is a view that I have been steadfast in when he was at Roma and was posting in the transfer forums those seasons as him being the keeper I most wanted to see us get.

He is simpy phenomenal in how well rounded he is and at how few weaknesses there are in his game. He is almost like a clone of Neuer with his he plays and with how he positions himself.

You would have to work really hard to show me a top level keeper that is/was a better all round keeper than Alisson over the past 40 or years.

The only four guys who I think pip Alisson as an all round keeper during that time would be Neuer, Peter Schmeichel, Oliver Kahn and Gianluigi Buffon. And they pip him for me due to their longevity in the game and the extremely high all round levels they produced for such a long span of time.

Yes there have been other excellent, frankly brilliant, keepers in that time but whilst some might had shaded Alisson in one or maybe two aspects of goal keeping, I cannot think of any other than the four I named that were as well rounded in all aspects goalkeeping and to such a high level as Alisson.

[Fredo]

Alisson is boringly good and is steady as ****. He's never really spectacular but his overall excellence makes it looks so easy. He's not the best in all aspects of the game, but he's the most rounded keeper you'll ever see as he does all these little things very well and even when having nothing to do he will come up and make a save worth of winning a game.

Before the mistake on Saturday he was very very good and even taking this into consideration he still had a good game.

[Doc_Piptorious]

Alisson is boringly good and is steady as ****. He's never really spectacular but his overall excellence makes it looks so easy. He's not the best in all aspects of the game, but he's the most rounded keeper you'll ever see as he does all these little things very well and even when having nothing to do he will come up and make a save worth of winning a game.

Before the mistake on Saturday he was very very good and even taking this into consideration he still had a good game.

That is exactly it. He is playing at such a high level and his positioning/concentration is at such a high level, he rarely has to move a lot to get the ball.

The best keepers in the world alwas appear as you said. They seem boring in their game because they are so good at reducing risk, whereas the "all action, throwing themselves around the goals" type keepers tend to be the guys who are poor at reading the game, poor at positioning so that the shot taker has more options to aim for in the goal, and will be poorer at maintaining a high level of concentration.

[Yozza]

Can't even believe people are doubting him

He's a brilliant attack minded possession based keeper who's just made some mistakes

Not worried about him in the slightest

[Tribute]

Can't even believe people are doubting him

He's a brilliant attack minded possession based keeper who's just made some mistakes

Not worried about him in the slightest

...don't think anyone is doubting him but he's allowed a wobble along with the rest of the outfield players. He just so happens to be having it right now...

Everyone seems confident he'll come through this but having some sort of settled defence in front of him would also help somewhat...