… that’s exactly what you’ve just done.
Fairly mainstream opinion : Onana isn’t Fabrice Ondoa, or very good
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He dives like a 44toon
3rd best in one statistic, not the best at anything
And you raise a valid point. Statistically United's problem isn't saving shots, but conceding too many shots. Wild deflections by the keeper lead to more shots, so the way he stops many shots indeed is part of the problem and could be improved upon.
Either way I think we agree that overall he isn't good, and that his CL performances have been worse than his PL performances.
Your post implies that someone claimed that others claimed that Onana was at fault for all goals, and then argues against doing so. It’s probably not a stretch to say that literally no one has ever accused anyone of claiming such a thing.
The kind of errors he made does not look like lack of confidence. It's just incapability. I mean if you lack confidence most errors you make are like not going for a ball you should have because you are not confident to get it, or you going for a ball with hesitation. Those FK shots were just basic shot stopping skills. They werent even great FKs.
at their end, yes!Banging a couple in vs Bayern would help too!
Comment is one thing; but it seems like he refused to cooperate with ETH who likely would have given him chances last season. He pushed to go out on loan and a move this sunmer (knowing there would be a new no 1 purchase). His issue with Ole's false promise and Rangnick is one thing, how he let this frustration to greatly influence his view on new manger (ETH) doesn't reflect well on him, in GK position, where as Peter Schmeichel revealed about his advice to Onana: just leave the past behind, and look to improve on what in front (paraphrasing here)
While contracted at United and on loan he said
- He was promised No 1 by Ole and club didn't follow through when he came back after Covid.
- He was disappointed that he was ineligible to play against United because he was itching to show us what we are missing.
- He didn't want to come back because he was afraid that ETH will see his awesomeness and try to keep him around when he doesn't want to play for us.
There is nothing wrong in being confident. But you don't have a go at the club when you are contracted there. You put your head down and get out by talking to people. Not to mention he comes across as cocky, when he is just another average keeper.
Not mean anything offensive toward anyone else in my last post. But if someone nitpicked and got it totally wrong to make silly argument (not you) on easy to remember incident like those, then I question their legitimacy as a fan. My last post remark clearly meant only toward the other poster. My apology if I rub some people wrong.
Anyways, during that season, Henderson had not been given enough gametime by this time of the season, where he 'd only played in domestic cup and the previous game coming on to replace an injured DDG at 0-2 against Southampton. We went on to make a comeback win that added to Henderson hype. For about next 3 weeks or so, even when DDG returned to full fitness, Ole rotated Henderson and De Gea in the league (Henderson continued to start in all domestic cup games). PSG and Leipzig defeat came which added fuel to the fire about dropping DDG; Ole still maintained GK rotation policy while started DDG in supposed more important game like against Man City in PL. Then Henderson howler against Sheffield United happened, and DDG came back as indisputable GK in PL for a long stretch until he took his leave to for his partner's childbirth in early March.
https://www.manutd.com/en/news/detail/solskjaer-confirms-de-gea-absence-following-birth-of-child
Henderson then went on to get a series of start in PL even after DDG came back, and pretty much became our PL starting GK since this childbirth absence toward the end of the season. Henderson started two early KO round EL, but by then since he started in PL, DDG was given EL games from quarter final round. Toward the end of the season, DDG got back to start a few games in PL.
EL final game came and here was where all hell broke loose. Henderson was originally our EL GK, and by then pretty much had become our starting GK if we account for Henderson DDG appearance ratio. Ole chose to start and finish this game with DDG (even when he had option to sub Henderson in for the p3nsoty shootout). DDG's pathetic penalty shootout performance created division in the team and the fanbase, and which also dented Ole's image.
https://www.transfermarkt.com/dean-henderson/leistungsdaten/spieler/258919/saison/2020/plus/1
Ole restarted new season with DDG as starter due to Henderson injury/COVID. Henderson himself seemed to expect to walk back into the team after getting fit, but then he found himself relegated back to cup GK role, when Ole had to fight for his dear life to save his job. We know what happened next.
Edit: the moral of the story is some posters who didn't follow the season closely would show their tail. That 20-21 season was very eventful in our GK department. Nobody in their right mind would choose to pick this season by lazily looking at mere numbers, and put all credit or blame on either DDG or Henderson, just to argue favorably for current situation with Onana.
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He's absolutely dreadful but to be fair as long as we're starting games with Lindelof and no midfield we'll keep conceding loads of goals regardless who is in net.
It's all well and good ETH saying he's second best in the league. Maybe he is not just on stats.
The problem is without his errors we probably have 5 more points in the CL. Potentially 6 if you count the Bayern game, and then we are 95% through instead of 95% out, and the whole season looks significantly more positive.
It's the manner of the errors as well. They aren't slight mistakes or "could have done better" moments. They're situations where he has quite literally created a goal for the opposition team out of next to nothing.
That's obviously a big problem. I want to like him but you can't have a keeper who is more likely to win the other team the game than help you, obviously. If it happens again at any point this season, especially when it matters, he's basically done. That's a lot of pressure to put on yourself due to such basic mistakes.
The problem is without his errors we probably have 5 more points in the CL. Potentially 6 if you count the Bayern game, and then we are 95% through instead of 95% out, and the whole season looks significantly more positive.
It's the manner of the errors as well. They aren't slight mistakes or "could have done better" moments. They're situations where he has quite literally created a goal for the opposition team out of next to nothing.
That's obviously a big problem. I want to like him but you can't have a keeper who is more likely to win the other team the game than help you, obviously. If it happens again at any point this season, especially when it matters, he's basically done. That's a lot of pressure to put on yourself due to such basic mistakes.
Stats this and stats that.
Last year for Inter he was trash in the league and everyone said "but look at the Champions League".
This year he is trash in the Champions League and everyone's going "but what about the league".
Across all competitions (fbref):
| Keeper/season | Save % | Crosses Stopped % | Sweeps per 90 | Total pass % | Mins per error |
| De Gea (2022/23) | 73.5% | 3.1% of all crosses | 0.92/90 min | 72.6% | every 1046th min |
| Onana (2023/24) | 72.4% | 4.1% of all crosses | 0.94/90 min | 74.9% | every 450th min |
The cold hard fact is that he hasn't drastically improved anything as far as goalkeeping goes except the error rate, which he has more than doubled.
I don't like it either when players air the club's dirty laundry in the public, but if it's true that Ole promised him a shot and then didn't follow through that actually is a legitimate concern. As for the second point, no big deal there. I'm not sure to make of the third point as that seems like speculation as opposed to fact. It seems -- and to make it clear, I have no knowledge of the true facts as to what goes on behind the scenes at OT -- that Henderson believed that the club had no belief in him and that he pushed for a transfer as opposed to being the backup to Onana, who replaced De Gea, whom the club offered a contract extension before renegging (sp?) on that contract extension after Dave dithered on that offer for a month or two. In short, Dean understood that the club no longer wanted him. If you're in that position knowing that you're no longer wanted, you move on.
But the point is, are we really better off with Onana than if we had kept Henderson? Another poster (can't recall who) mentioned Henderson's injury problems and of course it's hard to look past that, but if we can allow ourselves to look past that and just evaluate the two keepers on performance, it's pretty hard to argue that Onana is a better keeper than Henderson.
It's now 48 hours since Onanas last mistake and we are all greatful for the respite.
Also, the big difference between De Gea and Onana, other than De Gea actually being good, is that De Gea compensated for a poor defence while a poor defence and poor keeper like Onana is a match made in the depths of hell.
Someone earlier tried to claim De Gea lacks concentration because he's stood around doing nothing most of the time. This is absolute bollocks though as De Gea was as busy as keepers at relegation outfits every game.
The United job will humble any goalkeeper in the game right now. It's humbled Onana, it would do the same to Allison, Ederson or anyone else.
You know who it didn't humble though? That's right, good old Dave the Save. He's that rare breed of keeper that can go from standing around with nothing to do to having 20 shots at you every single game.
We probably would have been better off with a Pickford or that knobhead Martinez. Keepers comfortable under attack.
Someone earlier tried to claim De Gea lacks concentration because he's stood around doing nothing most of the time. This is absolute bollocks though as De Gea was as busy as keepers at relegation outfits every game.
The United job will humble any goalkeeper in the game right now. It's humbled Onana, it would do the same to Allison, Ederson or anyone else.
You know who it didn't humble though? That's right, good old Dave the Save. He's that rare breed of keeper that can go from standing around with nothing to do to having 20 shots at you every single game.
We probably would have been better off with a Pickford or that knobhead Martinez. Keepers comfortable under attack.
People acting like De Gea never single-handedly cost us games have clearly forgotten about Brentford away last season, amongst others. People can say that Brentford battered us more generally but De Gea gifted them their first two.
I can understand the scepticism surrounding Onana but for the love of God, can we please stop acting like De Gea never did this for us...
I can understand the scepticism surrounding Onana but for the love of God, can we please stop acting like De Gea never did this for us...
De Gea was hopeless at times, I remember the game against RB Leipzig away in the Champions League when he was awful and cost us the match and pretty much any chance of qualifying for the Knockout stages.
De Gea has certainly done some crazy shit, but it was more like 2-3 games a season. I think if we look at Onana's EPL record, considering he is also new to the club and EPL, most reasonable people wouldn't have too much to say about Onana. Not a great start, but kindof expected.
What is not OK at all is his performance in UCL. 14 fecking goals conceded in 5 games and majority of them his fault is way too much. That is much, much harder to explain
Not really for his fanboys. Just blame the defense and midfield for it.
Same as Maguire fanboys blamed De Gea and Lindelof for a year or so before accepting Maguire's faults.
Not a single person is. Every keeper that's ever played the game has had an absolute nightmare or two. It happens.
Onanas had 3 in the Champions League alone so far. Games, not mistakes. It's unprecedented.
The weird hate of De Gea resulted in people losing it because we conceded a goal. As if they'd never watched football before and were only just finding out the other team is also allowed to score. This was epitomised when that gimp made a 12 minute video of De Geas mistakes over 12 season and most of them were just normal goals.
What's worse about Onana as well is that we are actually competing in the games and it's his mistakes that cost us. Against Brentford we were not winning the game or getting a point whatever happened, we were awful. Same with Sevilla last season. Offered nothing in the game. Swap either keeper for anyone else in those games and it changes nothing in De Geas games but we'd have 7 more points from Onanas.
That guy claiming it was the wall, Martial and Mainoo at fault should go down in history as the biggest reach ever seen.
Hardly a majority. The one at Munich, the two in Turkey, you could partially add the third at home against Galatasaray after we were down to ten men due to his bad pass.
Of course, if we're knocked out, he'll be the first culprit as he cost us big in three games.
Cold.
It is indeed pretty strange that Onana's gaffes have essentially all come in the Champions League. In the Prem he has largely been fine - not outstandingly brilliant, but fine. The fact that his mistakes are all coming in one competition might have some explanation behind it, but I'd wager (and very much hope) that it's just the sort of randomness you sometimes see across a small sample size.
Your last paragraph is making the comparison unfair though. To say "Oh well, we'd have lost anyway without De Gea's howlers" doesn't negate the fact that he made them. Regardless of what else happened against Sevilla, De Gea was directly culpable for two of their three goals - the same as Onana against Galatasaray. I'd argue that the mistakes were pretty much equally as bad as well.
Eh, maybe. I'd say it's at least worth considering that it's a pretty small sample size, though. Throw in the fact that we concede too many shots and it's not entirely inexplicable.
I'm not trying to excuse Onana's Champions League performances; they've been absolutely horrendous. I'd probably even drop him against Newcastle just to make the point that those performances can't be tolerated here. What I am saying is, with what you've said about his Premier League performances largely being pretty fine, I think it's at least worth considering that he's not quite as shite as some are making out right now.
I'm not negating them, just adding the context that De Geas just topped off pathetic team performances while Onana undid all the hard work the team did.
Last time a keeper made mistakes that bad in the Champions League, his career fell off a cliff, practically went into hiding and forced You've Been Framed off the telly because you just could top bloopers like that.
No one denies that De Gea made mistakes. And before anyone replies that all keepers make mistakes, which is 100% true, what made Dave different is that in the same game he could make incredible saves that no other keeper on the planet could make and then commit some nasty howlers. The Benrahma goal sticks out in everyone's memory because it was the last straw, but we all remember other goals he conceded that were so mind-boggling precisely because he was so outstanding on so many other occasions.
With Onana, he's had more than a few very good games for us, including Everton, but he really hasn't made the kind of saves that Dave made routinely. His command of the both is nothing special, and neither was Dave. He's not much of a stopper in 1v1 situations, whereas Dave was. Onana's footwork is clearly better than Dave's but without any real effect on our buildup play. There's really nothing in the bargain in getting rid of Dave and bringing in Onana where it could be argued that we have a stronger keeper than Dave. And it's pretty clearly the case that we've taken a big step backward at keeper.
All we can hope for is that Onana is going though some kind of funk in his first season at OT and that he'll be in top form by the end of the season, but based on what we know now getting rid of Dave and bringing in Onana was a squad managent own goal by ETH, who was desperate for a "modern keeper" to bring about a "transformation" in our buildup play.
With Onana, he's had more than a few very good games for us, including Everton, but he really hasn't made the kind of saves that Dave made routinely. His command of the both is nothing special, and neither was Dave. He's not much of a stopper in 1v1 situations, whereas Dave was. Onana's footwork is clearly better than Dave's but without any real effect on our buildup play. There's really nothing in the bargain in getting rid of Dave and bringing in Onana where it could be argued that we have a stronger keeper than Dave. And it's pretty clearly the case that we've taken a big step backward at keeper.
All we can hope for is that Onana is going though some kind of funk in his first season at OT and that he'll be in top form by the end of the season, but based on what we know now getting rid of Dave and bringing in Onana was a squad managent own goal by ETH, who was desperate for a "modern keeper" to bring about a "transformation" in our buildup play.
Saying he was great in the league games is also extreme only going the other way to suit your narrative too. He didn’t make any howlers doesn’t equal great.Yet he was great in the league games before the last match.
Blindfold? What are you on about? He never said Onana is fine and had a good game or anything like that, just that fans should do their "job" and actually support new player that just had a great season, through some tough form and getting used to new league and have just a little patience. I guess that is too much to ask for new gen of fans.
Money laundering is what this was.
It would have been but Onana dropped the last bit of Daz.
Did he really burn his bridges or did we decide he’s not as good as De Gea? The latter, actually. As for Onana, we are fukked unless we can offload him.
All these arguments comparing DDG (rightly claimed to be past it by most at the time) are actually doing more to paint Onana in a bad light. If you're arguing for Onana why not compare him to peak DDG?
When though? At ajax? Because at Inter he was not great, he was just slightly less error prone than he is now... And only because he faced less shots.
As someone w a soft spot for United (my english team) I was absolutely gutted, sickened and depressed to see how much money you stuffed into Inter's pockets. A club that is beyond desperate financially. You helped save them for a mid-range keeper w good feet.
Two conflicting paragraphs there.
The shit that has been served is due to poor recruitment and tolerating poor performances for too long. Onana is yet another example of poor recruitment from a manager out of his depth.
He's not like Kepa at all. Kepa was statistically awful but didn't really make many actual howlers.
Onana is statistically very good but makes calamitous errors at bad times.
I'm hoping, really hoping, that he can reduce the number of errors as he calms down a bit. If he can, we'll have a perfectly good goalkeeper
Onana is statistically very good but makes calamitous errors at bad times.
I'm hoping, really hoping, that he can reduce the number of errors as he calms down a bit. If he can, we'll have a perfectly good goalkeeper
Obvious is Obvious.
He's got massive flaws and wont be a top top keeper until he gets them sorted.
Should Manchester Uniteds first team Keeper position be a school for goal keepers?
Should Onana be allowed to develop his basics as a first team first pick keeper ?
Absolutely not.
This is such a key position it needs scrutiny and strong management
He's got massive flaws and wont be a top top keeper until he gets them sorted.
Should Manchester Uniteds first team Keeper position be a school for goal keepers?
Should Onana be allowed to develop his basics as a first team first pick keeper ?
Absolutely not.
This is such a key position it needs scrutiny and strong management
What do you suggest? We are where we are.... Hopefully he can cut out some of the coachable issues
I realize that ETH is probably engaging in a bit of media cover for his keeper, but his comments on Onana being statistically the second best keeper in the league gave me an image of us posters scraping FBREF and WhoScored for data to substantiate our opinions or refine our intuitions.
Hoping and praying that the internal analytics shop is a bit more sophisticated than what OnanaWhat'sMyName1996 from Reddit can muster. Surely the club's setup and data utilization can't be that bad, right? Right?!?
Hoping and praying that the internal analytics shop is a bit more sophisticated than what OnanaWhat'sMyName1996 from Reddit can muster. Surely the club's setup and data utilization can't be that bad, right? Right?!?
Yes, that's what I meant. I should've said "for next summer". I hate to say it but city/pep would be looking for his replacement now. He did it with Bravo and many of his centre backs.