For me, Schmeichel is the greatest goalkeeper in our history. He’s everything that embodies a phenomenal goalkeeper. Maybe it’s a German thing as he reminds me of our prime Manuel Neur and Oliver Kahn. Strong in the air, can save penalties, score goals, command his defense etc. At the time of the poll, I was still debating between Van Der Sar or De Gea who is the second best but I always thought it’s not fair and gave the benefit of the doubt to De Gea as Van Der Sar was in one of our greatest United team while De Gea was our best player and had to singlehandedly rescue us in our post SAF team.
However, when you look back before De Gea declined, there are still some attributes of his game which doesn’t make him an all time great goalkeeper and that puts him behind Van Der Sar. He has a diabolical record in penalties, he doesn’t come off his line very often and doesn’t have the commanding presence or fear that strikes into strikers that great goalkeepers like Schmeichel and Van Der Sar possess.
Schmeichel reinvented goalkeeping at the time, changing the position to the same extent that Neuer has with the sweeper keeper role. No came out like he did, no one threw the ball as hard or as far. 92-94, massive throw to Cantona/Hughes, Kanchekskis/Giggs played in, counter attack goal. I’ve also never seen strikers sh*t their pants 1 on 1 so often.
VDS on the other hand was just calmness personified; a bit like Buffon. Wasn’t about the big showy saves but barely ever made a mistake, and if he did, he shrugged it off.
De Gea is the best reflex shot stopper I’ve ever seen; he makes saves no one else could make, and this could dip with age which is a worry.
3 truly great keepers, each with a different skill set, we’ve been lucky to have all of them and they’ve all be top 3 in the world at their peak. Even if de Gea’s decline is terminal, he’s still been a superb player for us for a long time. Shouldn’t let recency bias cloud that.