A Broken Hart

It has been some weekend of football once again and with a list of potential topics to pick from, one in particular stood out to me. Joe Hart and his seemingly grease coated goalkeeper gloves.

His latest blunder is one of many over the course of the last three or so years. In Manchester City’s home tie with Norwich City on Saturday the Citizens number one dropped what you would consider a bread and butter take from a cross right at the feet of former Palace loanee Cameron Jerome. The striker scored to level the scores with just seven minutes of normal time to go.

Manchester City managed to still win the game, courtesy of a Yaya Toure penalty, and did so too courtesy of a fine save from the England stopper right at the end from a deflected effort. It was an instinctive save and a commendable one.

It is not those instinctive reaction saves which are a problem for Hart. He actually excels in that area from what I can see. You could also say it is arguably easier to pull off the saves which are of pure instinct as there is no thinking time, no build of pressure or time for your mind to doubt itself.

When a cross is hanging in the air or a player goes through one on one there are those ‘time stand still’ moments where you need to put yourself in the right place and make the correct judgement call. It is at these moments where it all seems to go wrong for the twenty-eight year old. There is no doubting that over the years Joe Hart has had some fine moments in goal for club and country, but being able to do the basics to a near perfect standard is the foundation of a goalkeeper who is currently supposedly the best England have to offer.

In my opinion, it is probably about time that people realise that Hart is not quite as good as many hype him up to be. The country needs him to be fantastic. His club does too but he simply has not been so for quite a while. This has been down to the lack of real competitive options in that area and we have probably put way too much pressure on his shoulders.

If you compare the amount of top home grown goalkeeping talent in this country with the world’s leading nation when it comes to number one’s in Germany, it is almost embarrassing. In the Bundesliga at the weekend no less than ten German goalkeepers started matches, and that is in an eighteen team league as opposed to twenty in the Premier League. Just three Englishmen started in goal across the ten games in the top flight here in England, and even without the injuries to Fraiser Forster and Ben Foster that tally would only be bumped up to five. There is simply not enough competition to push Joe Hart, although a case could be made for the ever emerging Jack Butland at Stoke City.

The same applies at club level. Hart’s competitor, Argentinian Willy Caballero, has done his best to stay out of contention for City’s green jersey and before him, Pantillimon (now at Sunderland) is and was back then just as error prone.

Since the back end of 2012/13 Hart has suffered from a catalogue of errors that the best in the world  would not dream of making, and if they did, it would not happen again for a good few years. Hart may outwardly appear to have the confidence to keep bouncing back from mistake after mistake but deep down, what is he really thinking? He surely goes through stages of doubt. You can see on the field of play sometimes, he smiles and laughs an awful lot, he jumps around patting team mates on the back in excitement. You could argue that it is the behaviour of someone who clearly has talent but is still insecure and needs to always show a brave face. A case of ‘if everyone else thinks I am enjoying myself, I cannot go wrong.’

I would much rather my keeper dust himself down after making a save rather than jump up smiling at his teammates as if looking for praise. If you want all the glory, you should have been a striker Joe!

For me, if Hart was not English and part of Manchester City’s limited Champions League squad quota he would be back-up at best. If England could produce half the amount of talented goalkeepers many other European nations do, it goes without saying someone as error prone as Hart would be nowhere near a starting spot. It is a shame, because Hart probably has the ability. It is the inner strength of mind that appears to elude the former Shrewsbury Town man.

If you would like a bit of evidence as to some of the errors I am talking about, read this Daily Mail article and watch the YouTube video below, because to be blatantly honest, I would bore you having to list them all myself.

Now on to the rest of the action from the weekend.

Chelsea 1 Liverpool 3 – A great win for Liverpool, Jurgen Klopp’s first in the Premier League. Chelsea meanwhile, are in fifteenth place with just two wins from eleven all season. Imagine the odds you would have got at the start of the campaign that the Blues would be in this position after almost a dozen matches.

Crystal Palace 0 Manchester Utd 0 – The Eagles have never beaten United in a Premier League game. They have lost ten and drawn three. Win number one at Old Trafford later in the season maybe?

Newcastle United 0 Stoke City 0 – Jack Butland put in a performance and a half at St James’ Park. It could have easily been two or three nil to the Magpies. The young Englishman has completed more saves than any other top flight goalkeeper this season, with 36.

Swansea City 0 Arsenal 3 – The Gunners march on but we say that kind of thing about them a lot early doors, right? Who knows if they will last the pace. This was their third 3-0 win in their last four games.

Watford 2 West Ham United 0 – This was the Hammers first defeat on the road this season. Ighalo was the stand out performer as he hit a brace.

West Bromwich Albion 2 Leicester City 3 – A repeat of the score line from last season at the Hawthorns. Foxes hotshot Jamie Vardy has now become just the third ever Premier League player to score in eight consecutive games.

Everton 6 Sunderland 2 –The weekend’s highest scoring game came at Goodison Park. Everton have lost just three times this season, and those defeats have come against top-four sides Manchester City, Manchester United and Arsenal.

Southampton 2 Bournemouth 0 – This was the first ever top flight meeting between these two south-coast sides. Southampton expectedly came out on top.

Tottenham Hotspur 3 Aston Villa 1 – Let us all laugh at Villa. FOUR POINTS from their opening eleven games spells danger for the Midlands giants.

Cheers for reading. Same time next week?

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