Perhaps it's more accurate to say he didn't have a godawful defence with Blind playing centre back.
De Gea vs. Peter and Edwin
- Thread starter Offside
- Start date
-
In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik @Rood and Imran @Annihilate Now! start with the good news by celebrating Manchester United Women's emphatic FA Cup win over Spurs at Wembley and the future of manager Marc Skinner.
Then it's the bad news and the ever worsening form of our Men with losses to Arsenal and Palace.
Finally the main debate - ETH Out now or keep him until the end of the season - if not longer. Are you Team Nik or Team Imran?
There is only one goal-keeper, who made sure I watched pointless international matches and that is Schmeichel. For that reason, my vote would go to him
It seems pointless to compare DDG with Pete, as their styles & personalities are so vastly different.
The one thing that sticks in my mind with De Gea is the unbelievable amount of stick he got from all corners of the media during that first season. Everyone was desperate for him to fail. He was targeted as a weakness in almost every game. Always blocked off at corners, taking ridiculous pot shots from every angle. The Mirror kept calling him "De Howler" among other things. Many were saying he was a waste of money, Lindegaard should be the #1 for the remainder of the season and we were tipped to dip back into the market for another #1.
He definitely had weaknesses, but how quickly he improved on them and acclimatised to the physical nature of the league, all whilst ignoring pelters he was getting from everywhere, was quite astonishing. For me, he puts to bed the much-used remark of "not suited to the Premier League" that is used an excuse to not want a player, or to excuse poor performances of a new player. De Gea probably wasn't suited to the Premier League, but within a year or so, he made sure he was.
Now he is the undisputed best in the league, with an abyss of nothingness behind him, the gap between him and everyone else is that significant. He is currently sticking two fingers up at everyone who targeted him, doubted him, egged on his apparent certain failure. It puts De Gea at the top of the pile for me personally. I'm sure Schmeichel and Van der Sar went through periods of vast improvement elsewhere, but to see it from De Gea first hand as a supporter was magic. Schmeichel was my favourite player growing up, I sulked for days when I found out he was leaving, he was phenomenal. Still, De Gea is the best of the three IMO.
He definitely had weaknesses, but how quickly he improved on them and acclimatised to the physical nature of the league, all whilst ignoring pelters he was getting from everywhere, was quite astonishing. For me, he puts to bed the much-used remark of "not suited to the Premier League" that is used an excuse to not want a player, or to excuse poor performances of a new player. De Gea probably wasn't suited to the Premier League, but within a year or so, he made sure he was.
Now he is the undisputed best in the league, with an abyss of nothingness behind him, the gap between him and everyone else is that significant. He is currently sticking two fingers up at everyone who targeted him, doubted him, egged on his apparent certain failure. It puts De Gea at the top of the pile for me personally. I'm sure Schmeichel and Van der Sar went through periods of vast improvement elsewhere, but to see it from De Gea first hand as a supporter was magic. Schmeichel was my favourite player growing up, I sulked for days when I found out he was leaving, he was phenomenal. Still, De Gea is the best of the three IMO.
I love DeGea, I would say he's already a better shot stopper than Schmeichel or VDS.His career is still in its early stages when you consider he could go on to 40 if he takes good care of himself.He really has the potential to establish himself as the greatest keeper ever.Hope he does it in a United shirt.
What was prime VdS? When he was 2nd choice at Juve or playing at Fulham? Ajax? His spell at United was the best of his career. He's nowhere near the level of Schmeichel or De Gea.
I agree that it's hard to compare Schmeichel and De Gea due to their styles. Schmeichel has had some huge performances in big games though. Crucial saves in games that decided titles. Saving that penalty from Bergkamp saved the treble and saving from Van Basten in the shoot out in the Euros.
Schmeichel was a great keeper but mainly he was a leader and a big game player who stepped up when his team needed him. I miss having players with that sort of character at United.
Purely on the individual level, he's better than VDS and arguably better than Schmeichel. But overall, I have to lean towards Schmeichel. He just bought so much more to the table. If De Gea keeps it up for a few more seasons he might edge closer, but it'll be tough.
The incredible thing about VDS is that his best ever season, the one time he truly was the best goalkeeper in the world, was his last ever season at the age of 40. Before that he was always amongst the best, but not quite #1.
Shot-stopping, reflexes= de Gea
Organization, positioning= Van der Sar
Command of box, claiming crosses, counter attack, influence, psychological/mental strength= Schmeichel
Overall I will give Schmeichel as I feel his fear factor and strength makes his team mates better and opponents worse. And this overrides whatever slight deiciencies over DDG and VDS.
Still even Schmeichel has had his stinkers- I remember us getting smashed by 5-6 goals to crappy teams with big Dane making Taibi like errors. But he always came back stronger and stronger esp in back games
Organization, positioning= Van der Sar
Command of box, claiming crosses, counter attack, influence, psychological/mental strength= Schmeichel
Overall I will give Schmeichel as I feel his fear factor and strength makes his team mates better and opponents worse. And this overrides whatever slight deiciencies over DDG and VDS.
Still even Schmeichel has had his stinkers- I remember us getting smashed by 5-6 goals to crappy teams with big Dane making Taibi like errors. But he always came back stronger and stronger esp in back games
All three are excellent goalkeepers. I'd be glad to always have someone at their level. Between Schmeichel and Van der Sar, I don't remember how many years it was, but it seemed that for ages we couldn't find a proper goalkeeper. Painful era.
He was fantastic in the final
Schmeichel was the best at 1 on 1 situations, dealing with crosses, throwing. De Gea has the best handling and reflexes, VdS was the best kicker, and so very consistent.
In addition, all of them have great positioning, concentration, distribution - pretty much all that's needed to be great goalkeepers. We're really lucky to have this bunch. And Gary Bailey wasn't half bad too.
In addition, all of them have great positioning, concentration, distribution - pretty much all that's needed to be great goalkeepers. We're really lucky to have this bunch. And Gary Bailey wasn't half bad too.
DDG over VDS, I can't really comment on Schmeichel as I wasn't about to see enough games to make a proper judgement on how good he was.
I get the feeling people saying Schmeichel is superior than DDG only for his command of the box and presence only remember/watched him in his last couple seasons with us. From 1991(when he joined us) to around 96-97, Schmeichel was a monster in goal. Probably every great save DDG has made, you could find an equivalent if not better save from Schmeichel that period. Schmeichel's reflex and agility were astonishing, DDG is at best equal to it but superior? I don't think so.
To belabor the point made earlier, the peak era of Schmeichel we all remember is 7-8 years older than De Gea is now. If we're to properly compare the two players, we'd have to judge Dave now to the keeper Peter was 3 seasons before he even joined United.
It's safe to say that the David De Gea of 25 years old is a substantially better keeper of the Peter Schmeichel of 25 years old.
Dave's best days are still well ahead of him, amigos.
Rashford is better than a 18 y.o. Batistuta.
That is basically the Glaston's Alli>Pogba argument isn't it? The thread discussion here is whether DDG is already our best ever, and for me the DDG we have is not yet better than the Schmeichel we had.I missed Glaston's argument but I get the point.
But there's a massive difference between Alli and De Gea, isn't there? We can already say with extremely high confidence that De Gea is one of the top three keepers on the planet and with some confidence that he's the top keeper on the planet, based on his consistently outstanding performances of the last three seasons. We really can't say anything of the sort re Alli, can we?
But even if we ignore the fact that De Gea at 25 is being compared to Schmeichel at 32 we just can't ignore the fact that Schmeicehel had a vastly better squad all around him. I don't know how to quantify the chasm between the quality of Peter's late 90s squads to the 13-16 squads around Dave, but we can begin by counting trophies. 98/99 was a treble winner and 15/16 might be an FA cup winner and steal fourth place and it's safe to say that the 98/99 would have completely destroyed the 15/16 side. It really is much easier to be a great keeper when you have great defenders -- Bruce, Pallister, Irwin, Neville and Stam -- than when you don't -- Smalling, Blind, Rojo, Darmian, Valencia.
Clearly Peter was a great keeper, one of the greatest of all time. But De Gea has already demonstrated he's the equal if not greater keeper. And he's 8 years ahead of Peter's schedule. Before it's all done for Dave, he'll be regarded as the greatest keeper of all time.
So Smike was one of the greatest of all time, but De Gea is already equal if not the greater keeper? Are you saying that DDG is equal to if not the greater keeper than Buffon and Kahn? because Smike belongs to those names level.
Would he even be in the best premier league XI, if DDG retire this summer?
Would he even be in the best premier league XI, if DDG retire this summer?
Last edited:
Loved VdS as a player and keeper, but can't help and think that he was a tier below Big Dane and DDG. Still an excellent keeper mind.
Going back to the point I made earlier...
Schmeichel's best period was 91-97. Did we really have much better defenders back then? Neville was just coming through ala Rafael for us, before him was Paul Parker. Bruce was more of a great leader, neither he nor Pally were regarded as the best CBs of the 90s. Irwin was probably the one top class defender for me we had in the period. Not to mention, english teams were more reckless in the 90s where practically every team played 2 up top. Even in having better defenders (not by a great stretch), the keeper was often more exposed than what DDG has to deal with. Now, teams are more cautious and most teams sit deep, playing against us with 1 frontman. Not taking anything away from DDG, he's certainly talented but the best of DDG at Man United so far hasn't surpass Schmeichel yet, whether that be the best of Schmeichel or his United career as a whole.
It is different watching all 3 for me.
With PS, I didn't feel like watching how our defense played. I knew they were somehow organized. I was probably too young to know/care all of it anyway at his peak.
With VDS, I had no interest in VDS. I only watched how Vidic would head out any ball flying into the box and how Rio would just take the ball from any striker like they were a kid playing against him. I have to say I always felt like he would save penalty every single time because he was very good at it.
With DDG, Whenever the ball comes into our box, I am thrilled to see how DDG will save it.
I think PS is still the best overall. But, in term of pure saves, it will be hard to beat DDG though.
With PS, I didn't feel like watching how our defense played. I knew they were somehow organized. I was probably too young to know/care all of it anyway at his peak.
With VDS, I had no interest in VDS. I only watched how Vidic would head out any ball flying into the box and how Rio would just take the ball from any striker like they were a kid playing against him. I have to say I always felt like he would save penalty every single time because he was very good at it.
With DDG, Whenever the ball comes into our box, I am thrilled to see how DDG will save it.
I think PS is still the best overall. But, in term of pure saves, it will be hard to beat DDG though.
Last edited:
De Gea is the best for me.
If he had had a more competent defence in front of him the last few years he could of challenged for VdS clean sheet record.
If he had had a more competent defence in front of him the last few years he could of challenged for VdS clean sheet record.
He's the best in the world, the Premier League's best ever and Manchester United's best ever.
I always thought Edwin was a level below Schmeichel, so I'd currently put DDG in the middle - but a lot closer to big Pete.
Totally agree with this. Schmeichel is still above Dave for me. He was totally dominant for years and did it on an international level as well. Some of his saves were just incredible.
In 5 years time De Gea will almost certainly surpass him but for now he's not quite there yet IMO. Would put him above Van der Sar though.
More importantly why is Taibi not on the list??
I don't yet rate DDG as highly as Schmeichel. But DDG has the edge in terms of speed, agility and sharpness; he's like a coiled spring. He could probably dodge bullets like Neo
Well DDG hasn't won a EPL winners medal yet. At least according to his manager.
1. Pete.
2. De Gea
2. Van der Sar
2. De Gea
2. Van der Sar
I love VDS, so in a spate of persona bias, I'd go with
VDS > DDG = Pete
VDS > DDG = Pete