I didn’t know a great deal about him before he came here. Obviously, I had heard of him, but never really watched him. I asked a few people on here about him just to see what type of GK he was because I was a little skeptical about the signing. But everyone seemed to think he was a genuine world-class signing.
Now, he’s only been here for a very short time. That's important to say as things can change. But I just don’t see it with him at the moment. Just assessing him as a pure shot-stopper, etc., he seems to be very average and quite unorthodox even when he does make some saves. He comes across as a bit of a flapper. De Gea at his best (and any great keeper, really) had a certain composure and precision when it came to his shot-stopping, if that makes sense. Onana seems to be a bit frantic, almost.
But the most disappointing aspect of all has to be his distribution and his patrolling of the area just outside the box. This was the ONE thing that nearly everyone who purported to know a lot about him said he was world-class at. This was the aspect of his game that was going to be transformative. But I’m not getting it. His distribution (outside one or two examples) hasn't been anything special at all. In fact, I often find him annoyingly slow on the ball. He holds it for way too long. Now that’s not just his problem as we’re not exactly functioning great as a team at the moment, but I’m really not seeing it with him.
And the one thing that De Gea got hammered for was the fact that he was always glued to his line. Well, this guy appears to be doing exactly the same. So is this now a coaching issue? Because apparently, this is where he excelled. In fact, the only time I can remember him being out in a position where you would almost consider him a deep-lying CDM, or a CB, was that game where he got chipped from halfway (can’t remember the game) and people blamed him for that, as opposed to Dalot who was really at fault. I didn’t mind Onana being out by there, because that’s why I thought we bought him. But I’ve seen very little of it since.
Anyway, I really hope he does turn into the keeper that many on here thought he would be. I just worry with our track record that we’ve invested another chunk of money into an important position and fecked it again. I really hope I’m wrong.