David de Gea: an excellent season of ‘saving Manchester United’, but did he really save them?

David de Gea, an excellent individual season of ‘saving Manchester United’ as the narrative goes, however, has he actually saved Manchester United, or has he been the problem that’s stopping them from moving upwards as a team? We’ve looked into the season that he and the team have had, and figured out whether the saying is true, or a myth.

It’s key to first define the job of a goalkeeper; their job is to prevent the opposition from scoring goals, this could be seen as the primary job of a goalkeeper as many managers have other roles that their goalkeepers fulfil. A common myth is that their job is to ‘save shots’, in a sense, it is true, if you save shots, it does prevent a goal, but the job extends much further than just saving shots.

Another thing that I see a lot of is people making a comparison between shot stopping and shot prevention, with many claiming that shot stopping is more important. Think of it as a game of probabilities, if one attempts to stop a shot, there is still a chance that a goal is scored, whereas if you prevent the shot, there is no chance that a shot leads to a goal, since there would be no shot. To add some context, Alisson Becker has the best save percentage in the league with 76%, this means that he was unable to save 24% of the shots that he faced this season, however, if he were to prevent these shots, then there is a 0% chance of a shot leading to a goal.

Now onto De Gea, we’ve looked at some of the main aspects of a goalkeeper’s game; shot stopping, shot prevention, and distribution, which is key in a possession-based side (as Erik ten Hag plays).

Shot Stopping

We can break shot stopping down into three main categories; 1 vs 1s, longshots, and mid-range shots (those that don’t classify as a 1 vs 1 or a longshot). De Gea concedes a worrying number of longshots, he appears to see the flight of the ball too late, and dives too late without being able to cover the corners.

This was clearly shown with Moises Caicedo’s goal at the Amex, and Granit Xhaka’s at the Emirates. He’s always been weak with long shots, we’ve seen it numerous times in the past, and again we’ve seen it this season. It is a worrying trend.

Moving onto his 1 vs 1s, as per the data from @Jhdharrison1 (Head data scientist @ goalkeeper.com), De Gea is actually negative in terms of 1 vs 1 saves – expected saves per 90. This shows that he’s conceded more than expected, further proving his shot stopping isn’t as good as it seems to be. Using his p90 stat, we’ve conceded around 17 1 vs 1s this season that we shouldn’t have, which isn’t ideal for a goalkeeper of his calibre. It’s important to mention that he does face a lot of 1 vs 1s, but many of the goalkeepers in the positive section face more and save more!

You may ask, why does De Gea concede so many 1 vs 1s then; it’s mostly down to his poor technique. Whenever a forward is approaching him in a 1 vs 1, he not only fails to come out in order to close down the angle, he actually positions himself so that his body is very tight, making him very easy to beat.

While I highly doubt that this is intentional, it is very worrying that a goalkeeper has regressed so much in his 1 vs 1 positioning and performance, and now forwards aren’t even scared of having to go 1 vs 1 with him! With this tight body shape, he leaves a lot of space for the forward to shoot at, hence making it much easier for them to score!

This leaves the subcategory of mid-range shots, ones that neither classify as a longshot, nor a 1 vs 1. This is also the area where the xG is much lower, hence he is expected to save a lot more of these shots, which he does. It’s the area which he accumulates most post-shot expected goals (PSxG) as he’s able to save these shots.

Overall, this proves that De Gea is good at one aspect of shot stopping (mid-range), he has conceded 0.2 more goals than expected (based of PSxG – GA), and ranks 4th in this category. Some say that his shot stopping is world class, but everything shows that he is in fact just a decent shot stopper.

Shot Prevention

Shot prevention for me is the most important part of a goalkeeper’s game, and in De Gea’s case, it is one of the worst parts. As per the FBref end of season report, De Gea faced on average 8 crosses per game, and only stopped 3.3% of them, ranking him in the 6th percentile for crosses stopped and crosses stopped %.

When a goalkeeper stops a cross, they immediately remove pressure off their backline as the defender’s no longer have the need to contest for a high ball; this is very important against certain sides that are aerially dominant in attack as it reduces the chance of your team’s defenders getting beaten in the air.

It also affects a team’s set piece strategy; if they know that the goalkeeper is poor at dealing with high balls, they will look to target the 6-yard box where the defence is most vulnerable and the GK has little chance of saving a shot. Having a strong, commanding GK prevents teams from doing this, as instead they will need to work their set pieces differently due to the GK coming out to claim the high ball.

Seen on the graphic designed by @JackFawcett1704, Manchester United concede a worrying number of goals inside their 6-yard box due to the goalkeeper’s lack of control of their area. This is where De Gea’s shot stopping is ineffective, and he concedes so many due to his inability to prevent shots from occurring in this area by claiming crosses etc.

Cross stopping mostly depends on the goalkeeper, here is Alisson’s report, he is in the 46th percentile for crosses stopped, and 75th percentile for % crosses stopped, which is crucial to Liverpool’s side as he looks to ease pressure off the back line.

Further, goalkeepers in a worse side are also able to stop crosses, Nick Pope is a key example of this; Burnley have been relegated this season yet Pope completed 46 high claims, that’s almost 6x the number that De Gea completed. The lack of cross stopping hurts our side, and constantly puts us under pressure aerially.

The other main part of shot prevention is sweeping. Sweeping is necessary in a high line as the GK has a lot of space that they need to command, there will be lots of chances created by the opposition from a simple long ball to a fast forward, a goalkeeper must deal with these. Sweeping is the task of rushing out to clear away the ball, or close down the angle for a shot by making their body bigger. Having said this, even in a low block when the defence is beaten, a goalkeeper is expected to sweep instead of staying to his line.

De Gea is terrible at sweeping, and it’s also one of the main reasons why he concedes so many 1 vs 1 goals. As per FBref, he completes 0.24 sweeping actions p90, ranking him in the 6th percentile., that too, these actions aren’t very far out from his goal.

We can compare this to the number that Alisson completes, 1.75 p90 ranking him in the 96th percentile.

Alisson arguably has the best defence in the league, yet he has to sweep a lot every game, why’s that? It’s because Liverpool play a high line, hence they need a proactive GK. As long as we continue to attempt to play a high line with De Gea, it will fail, as De Gea is not a proactive GK, and relies too heavily on his defence to deal with every ball.

Both measures of shot prevention aren’t in De Gea’s favour whatsoever, they show that he is a timid goalkeeper, who cannot command his area, and does not help his back line at all due to the lack of crosses that he deals with. Having such terrible shot prevention means that you must make up for it in other categories, but that is not the case as again with his shot stopping, he’s conceded more than he should’ve, making him an overall net negative in the ‘primary job of a goalkeeper’

Distribution

In different systems, distribution can mean different things. A goalkeeper should be able to complete most of his short passes and not be turning over possession in dangerous areas due to his poor distribution, then in a possession-based system, a goalkeeper may be expected to play line-breaking passes, as Ederson, Alisson and Sanchez all do.

In the Goalkeepers Distribution model, De Gea ranks right at the very bottom, showing he is the worst performing GK in terms of distribution, as per FBref, he also attempts around 16 passes p90, ranking him in the 2nd percentile amongst Premier League goalkeepers,

Alisson attempts 33, ranking him in the 87th percentile. In a possession-based side, that both Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and Ralf Rangnick attempted to play, a goalkeeper must be adept with the ball at his feet, almost playing as a 3rd CB, De Gea is quite the opposite, being one of the key reasons that both of the two managers failed.

As Steve McClaren (Manchester United’s assistant manager for next season) has described, ‘with one pass, the GK can eliminate the whole team’, De Gea is not able to do that, which is a major worry as he is practically unsellable at this point.

Further, a goalkeeper must instil confidence in the side as he should always be a player who’s available for the pass and be a calming presence in the side.

There have been numerous occasions this season where a defender has passed the ball back to De Gea, and he has kicked it away for a turnover in a dangerous positions (notable one for De Paul’s shot vs Atletico). This is terrible as it constantly leads to the team being under opposition pressure, which increases the volume of defending required, and the chance of a goal being scored. It also limits our ability to play the way we want to, we cannot implement this possession football when you have a play who constantly gives the ball away in the defensive 3rd under no pressure.

Even when you ignore advanced distribution, De Gea is incredibly poor at doing the basics. He’s not good with his feet, and he’s not a calming influence on the side, defenders aren’t able to pass the ball back to him as they do not trust him with the ball. In order for ETH to implement his possession football, he must either train De Gea to be better with the ball, or use a different goalkeeper!

Conclusion

This De Gea conundrum creates a huge vicious cycle, his lack of shot prevention and ability with the ball at his feet leads to United being under more pressure defensively, which then means that he faces more shots, and as good as his reflex saves are, he only saves around 69.2% of the shots that he faces.

However, Manchester United have been unable to drop him, so this continues over and over again in an endless loop, this is without even considering the detrimental effect that he has on our team play in possession, as he is unable to provide himself as a passing option, and often loses the ball when we are trying to build up.

Unfortunately, all the metrics show that he is a poor goalkeeper, his overall shot prevention & distribution is poor, and when looking at his shot stopping, he’s good at reflex saves & mid-range shots, but concedes too many 1 vs 1s and longshots.

People try to say that his defence is poor, and whilst I agree to some extent, this defence (possible an even worse one as some fans say with Aaron Wan-Bissaka and Luke Shaw) did better with a more proactive goalkeeper, Dean Henderson.

In order for Erik Ten Hag to be successful at Manchester United, he must follow Luis Enrique and drop De Gea, replacing him with either Dean Henderson, or going into the market to sign someone else.

As a final answer to the original question, NO! David de Gea has not saved Manchester United’s season, and has instead made it a worse season than what we should’ve had with a different goalkeeper!