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Guglielmo Vicario

Most goalkeepers have weaknesses that negatively impacts the rest of the team.

I hope he will become more predictable in those set piece situations. I think he and the team are dealing with those better now than last season.

Yes but his weakness is a major one IMO. He doesn’t deal with crosses full stop and it causes issues.
 
He sat down and needed treatment after about 38 minutes. It was the challenge from Savinho, after Porro tried to head the ball back. So he played the last 10 minutes of the 1st half, and the entire 2nd half with a fractured ankle, and put in that performance!
What a man!
Reminded me of this guy:

 
Drama!? Seriously. It’s a football forum. The sort of place people can project their opinion.

It wasn’t a great list but I only named the English ones as I was restricted due to squad make up.

At least we’ve got Reguillon using up a space though.

The point of "whole squad mismanaged" is OTT, hence the drama comment

If we had made it to summer, would have looked smart, we haven't, so in hindsight the club took a risk that didn't work out.

I think the intention would be someone that can genuinely challenge Vic, really don't think any of those do.
 
The point of "whole squad mismanaged" is OTT, hence the drama comment

If we had made it to summer, would have looked smart, we haven't, so in hindsight the club took a risk that didn't work out.

I think the intention would be someone that can genuinely challenge Vic, really don't think any of those do.
They don’t
A keeper I haven’t seen enough of but I’ve heard is playing great is Leicesters keeper
As I mentioned earlier the keeper at Stoke is playing well and HG although he is now playing for Sweden
He could be the kind of signing you make for 18 months whilst the younger ones stay on loan
 
The point of "whole squad mismanaged" is OTT, hence the drama comment

If we had made it to summer, would have looked smart, we haven't, so in hindsight the club took a risk that didn't work out.

I think the intention would be someone that can genuinely challenge Vic, really don't think any of those do.

Whilst every club will struggle replacing certain players (Rodri as a prime example), we do have a penchant for seemingly just hoping key players don't get injured. Last season, one CB injury had us playing Dier who clearly didn't fit the bill despite being a good player who served us well.

This time it is Forster who is likely to come in and struggle. Maybe the worried among us will come to eat our words but I'm not so sure. At least there's no penalty shoot outs in the league. But this is a bit of a suckerpunch from nowhere, it's easy to say we should have prepared better for it but it's blindingly obvious and has been since Forster got a new contract.
 
Some names from reddit (not my posts/opinions)

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Jason Steele is 34. He is better than Forster though, Steele is also very good with his feet, which would be hugely useful. Problem is if he comes across, surely we're going to have to give him a 2-3 year deal and it would seem weird after giving Austin a 5 year deal.

Could we pay Brighton a decent amount (£5M-£8M) for a 6 month loan though whilst paying his full wages, they may accept that and i think it would be a good stopgap.

Jose Sa would be a good option IMO. I wanna say his contract runs out in 12 months time, if we offer Wolves £10M or so, we may get a decent deal there, only 31 so could be backup for another 3-4 years probably.

Has had some amazing performances and is solid IMO.

Long shot but who i'd really want - Hakon Valdimarsson from Brentford. Just turned 23, Brentford bought him for £3M basically 12 months ago (January 2024). He hasn't started for Brentford yet but he is now the #1 for Iceland and has looked great. Its honestly a miracle that they haven't dropped Flekken for him. Give him a 5 year deal, pay Brentford the £15M or so it'll take and he can sit behind Vicario for a couple years whilst deputising and hopefully turn into a gem.

----

Given the nature of the January window, I wonder if we go back in for Oliver Christensen. POK alluded that he was our next option after Vicario when he was at Hertha Berlin. Played a few matches for Fiorentina last season but got hurt and has now been effectively relegated to 3rd/4th choice. Would be an easy deal for the club to do if they wanted to go down that path again.

-----

Realistically? Someone like Mark Travers from Bournemouth. Always plays well for them, but gets benched for worse keepers, like Kepa. Homegrown too, which we need to consider.

-----

Some keepers attached to PL clubs id be interested in: Djordje Petrovic, Kelleher, Jason Steele, Dean Henderson.

Might be a bit of a risk but Patrick Schulte looks to be the presumptive USA future No 1 and could probably be had for relatively cheap.
 
Whilst every club will struggle replacing certain players (Rodri as a prime example), we do have a penchant for seemingly just hoping key players don't get injured. Last season, one CB injury had us playing Dier who clearly didn't fit the bill despite being a good player who served us well.

This time it is Forster who is likely to come in and struggle. Maybe the worried among us will come to eat our words but I'm not so sure. At least there's no penalty shoot outs in the league. But this is a bit of a suckerpunch from nowhere, it's easy to say we should have prepared better for it but it's blindingly obvious and has been since Forster got a new contract.

It's risk management/priorities, started last season a CB or two light but if you look at the LW situation last season you realize how little you can truly cover all circumstances, didn't we have Perisic, Richi, Solomon, Sess & Son all out at same point?
 
Some names from reddit (not my posts/opinions)

----

Jason Steele is 34. He is better than Forster though, Steele is also very good with his feet, which would be hugely useful. Problem is if he comes across, surely we're going to have to give him a 2-3 year deal and it would seem weird after giving Austin a 5 year deal.

Could we pay Brighton a decent amount (£5M-£8M) for a 6 month loan though whilst paying his full wages, they may accept that and i think it would be a good stopgap.

Jose Sa would be a good option IMO. I wanna say his contract runs out in 12 months time, if we offer Wolves £10M or so, we may get a decent deal there, only 31 so could be backup for another 3-4 years probably.

Has had some amazing performances and is solid IMO.

Long shot but who i'd really want - Hakon Valdimarsson from Brentford. Just turned 23, Brentford bought him for £3M basically 12 months ago (January 2024). He hasn't started for Brentford yet but he is now the #1 for Iceland and has looked great. Its honestly a miracle that they haven't dropped Flekken for him. Give him a 5 year deal, pay Brentford the £15M or so it'll take and he can sit behind Vicario for a couple years whilst deputising and hopefully turn into a gem.

----

Given the nature of the January window, I wonder if we go back in for Oliver Christensen. POK alluded that he was our next option after Vicario when he was at Hertha Berlin. Played a few matches for Fiorentina last season but got hurt and has now been effectively relegated to 3rd/4th choice. Would be an easy deal for the club to do if they wanted to go down that path again.

-----

Realistically? Someone like Mark Travers from Bournemouth. Always plays well for them, but gets benched for worse keepers, like Kepa. Homegrown too, which we need to consider.

-----

Some keepers attached to PL clubs id be interested in: Djordje Petrovic, Kelleher, Jason Steele, Dean Henderson.

Might be a bit of a risk but Patrick Schulte looks to be the presumptive USA future No 1 and could probably be had for relatively cheap.

If Vic is estimated out for 4-8 weeks, we don't want a 6 month gap filler. We need an emergency loan tomorrow, and then a proper medium-to-long term solution come January (Tickle would be my suggestion).
 
Thankfully the top notch recruiting team we have made the necessary moves to ensure we're not relying on a lumbering Frankenstein or two 20 somethings with little to no first team experience in case Vic gets injured.
 
It's risk management/priorities, started last season a CB or two light but if you look at the LW situation last season you realize how little you can truly cover all circumstances, didn't we have Perisic, Richi, Solomon, Sess & Son all out at same point?

That's the point though, you can't account for every situation, but you can be vaguely prepared. If you get 5 injuries in the same position, sure you can start waving your fist at the sky but it's a huge drop off in quality by having 1 player injured. Some would say an unacceptable drop off in quality but they would be those arseholes who think we should actually act like a big club and maybe do well in competitions.

I don't think it's asking too much to have a suitable back up goalkeeper, the idea of your number 1 getting injured isn't some far out unthinkable suggestion, it's the reality we face. Maybe it'll actually be fine, I'll endeavor to keep an open mind, by all accounts he had a good game in the europa league. However, if we go out on pens against United in the league cup with their players simply needing to get theirs on target I might actually have a long overdue mental breakdown. Time will tell.
 
I don't see how we would qualify for getting an emergency loan, as we have 3 fit goalkeepers in the squad. I know very little about Austin and Whiteman, but are they really so shockingly bad that they can't play for a couple of months? If that's the case, why are they at the club? Forster has played well in the games he's played.

Not even sure the club are even considering loaning a GK.
 
I don't see how we would qualify for getting an emergency loan, as we have 3 fit goalkeepers in the squad. I know very little about Austin and Whiteman, but are they really so shockingly bad that they can't play for a couple of months? If that's the case, why are they at the club? Forster has played well in the games he's played.

Not even sure the club are even considering loaning a GK.
The club aren’t
It’s our fans who are
 
Interesting to see whether we now put Austin in goal for the EL games. Forster is 36 and his body won't be used to playing 2 competitive games every week. He may need protecting.

I'm not sure why we have that loan rule in football anyway. We have Forster, Whiteman, Austin, Gunter, Maguire and Karsniqi all over 18 years of old. It's not like we have to play kids in a mens game. They are all men.
 
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