1 minute ago, abramovich said:

Having watched Sanchez for some time now I'm fairly confident it's a mental issue. He's a good shot stopper and if things go well he is capable of having solid stretches when seemingly he's doing well and looks in control. But he's also always one brainfart move away from completely losing his confidence and then it becomes an issue not just for him bit for the whole team.

Too many mistakes that cost the team time and again. We have to make a desicion, either trust Penders to be the first choice, or go for someone assured and experienced, because sticking with Sanchez after everything we've witnessed over the years is a crime.

I was really surprised by him last night. He genuinely did great last year aside from when Rosenior ruined him for a bit.

He was shocking in 24/25, the stats bear that out, which I put at Maresca's door - and he fixed that by stopping his insistence on Sanchez playing short.

Last night was the first game I've seen where he's brain farted to such an extent, 3 times, without me being able to blame anyone but himself. Perhaps there's been a conversation behind the scenes about him leaving or Martinez coming in, perhaps its the pressure of Penders in training. He may have f**ked himself though, if he'd performed to the level he can last night, no one would be suggesting he leaves.

44 minutes ago, JM7 said:

It’s a difficult situation for the club as he will be hard to move on plus you’ve got the added complexity of not wanting to stall Penders development.

Penders is still too young to become our number one and we likely end up with the same situation of errors.

Agree, ideally you want your number one with Penders as back up, imo absolutely no point in having a new No1. with Sanchez as back up. However really can't see Sanchez going anywhere at this late stage if he is replaced, and absolutely pointless keeping Penders here if he's not going to be a number two.

I'm glad he had an awful game yesterday. We still won, and its the perfect opportunity to put Penders in for Luton and let him stay in if he does well. As others have said - as long as Penders stays he has to play, and yesterday only makes that decision easier for Xabi

1 hour ago, bisright1 said:

I was really surprised by him last night. He genuinely did great last year aside from when Rosenior ruined him for a bit.

He was shocking in 24/25, the stats bear that out, which I put at Maresca's door - and he fixed that by stopping his insistence on Sanchez playing short.

Last night was the first game I've seen where he's brain farted to such an extent, 3 times, without me being able to blame anyone but himself. Perhaps there's been a conversation behind the scenes about him leaving or Martinez coming in, perhaps its the pressure of Penders in training. He may have f**ked himself though, if he'd performed to the level he can last night, no one would be suggesting he leaves.

Penny needs to drop mate. He's always been sh*t - you can't keep blaming the manager, especially when it comes to goal keeper.

He was a terrible signing, nowhere near good enough and we hugely overpaid.

I've no idea which of our legion of Sporting Directors wants to keep this turd in the squad but Xabi needs to knock some heads together.

Edited 18 hours ago18 hr by Gordon Bennett

2 minutes ago, Gordon Bennett said:

Penny needs to drop mate. He's always been sh*t - you can't keep blaming the manager, especially when it comes to goal keeper.

He was a terrible signing, nowhere near good enough and we hugely overpaid.

I've no idea which of our legion of Sporting Directors wants to keep this turd in the squad but Xabi needs to knock some heads together.

Outside of the arsenal league cup game, where Rosenior decided to force him to play the way he can't play. Which game last season did he make a significant error? He was great all season.

The narrative has spun that he's always like this. He's not. He improved massively last season, was easily our most improved player.

Last night has probably killed him though.

Bob doesn't seem very bright, he hesitates, looks unaware of danger, and makes wrong decisions on his distribution. It is all mental it's just that Sanchez does not have the mentality to be elite.

3 minutes ago, Scott said:

Bob doesn't seem very bright, he hesitates, looks unaware of danger, and makes wrong decisions on his distribution. It is all mental it's just that Sanchez does not have the mentality to be elite.

I honestly think he might not be quite all there. Constantly got that gormless, half-sharp look on his face.

15 minutes ago, Scott said:

Bob doesn't seem very bright, he hesitates, looks unaware of danger, and makes wrong decisions on his distribution. It is all mental it's just that Sanchez does not have the mentality to be elite.

Agree with Sanchez but harsh on @Bob stark

I don't get the feeling that many people think that Penders can be first choice for us now, at 21. But if he is second choice, why can't he be first now? If Sanchez broke his leg on the 2nd September, then Penders is first choice for the season.

54 minutes ago, Sconnie Blue said:

Agree with Sanchez but harsh on @Bob stark

No, Bobby S is top bloke.

3 hours ago, yaz said:

Ben Roberts. Get him out of the club and Sanchez will go as well.

As long as he's here Sanchez will be our #1.

This he’s the one that’s keeping Sanchez as number 1

My only concern with dropping him, is the pressure it puts on Penders. If he cracks under that pressure we really are screwed

2 hours ago, Gordon Bennett said:

I honestly think he might not be quite all there. Constantly got that gormless, half-sharp look on his face.

You could say that about almost all professional footballers

2 minutes ago, PloKoon13 said:

You could say that about almost all professional footballers

I don't know it's a bit special in his case

Sign Martinez, we can’t expect the front 3 to outscore the opposition all the time.

Sanchez makes the entire team shaky.

Why are we persisting with Brightons reserve keeper?

It’s been years now, I don’t know how good Penders is but he’s 21. When is he going to be ‘ready’. If he ain’t better than Sanchez right now then what are we doing?

We signed Cech when he was 22, straight in. Their keepers, it’s not like they have to get used to the pace of the game. Sign Martinez and ease Penders in but Sanchez is a liability. I struggle with all the player upheaval to see why this guy keeps his place.

The legend that was Peter Chech was 21/22 when we signed him. So no issues if the club promote Penders, Chech turned out alright, and he was turd with the ball at his feet unless he was going long, when he would find Drogba's head regularly. Game has changed but keepers used to play percentages kicking to the corner of the halfway line or beyond for distance from goal.... and there is nothing wrong with Sanchez doing that for us and just being a keeper.

Every manager, it appears, wants keepers to do Cruyff turns in their six-yard box, take 2 touches and send a defence-splitting pass. (sanchez got a couple of assists last season from his distribution so he can do it)

Given the lack of decent keepers, Im happy with Sanchez for now. give him a few more games in Alonso's system, think it'll all settle down given how well drilled they looked yesterday when not in possession. We looked tight and tidy; the first game of the season is the best one to get the ricks out of the system. Cant have too many more.

If there was a keeper to replace Sanchez, I'd hope the club would look at Pickfrod, but would need a crowbar to get him to leave everton.

Thinking on it more, I really don't want us to sign Martinez. Think he could actually be a downgrade on Sanchez. He's had some stinking performances and gets away with it as he's the Villa keeper.

45 minutes ago, PloKoon13 said:

You could say that about almost all professional footballers

Sanchez is the modern day Gabby Agbonlahor.

Okay, maybe not quite that bad.

The goalkeeper market is atrocious and Martinez isn’t the answer. Seen mentions of Simon (of Bilbao) had a good World Cup, good with his feet/sweeping but shot stopping is just alright, and being a ‘basque’ player with ‘reportedly’ no release clause, they’ll want Kepa money. Probably why there’s been zero links of him going anywhere, that, and the fact he simply isn’t elite.

And once an ‘elite’ keeper emerges… we’ll have competition from Real Madrid and others for such a talent, given the ages of the only decent keepers around these days being 30+.

Sigh.

Little piece on Emi Martinez from mid last-season, when Sanchez was looking great at the time and Aston Villa were flying high. Martinez and his propensity for errors was seen as their weakness.

Butt his graph was pretty damning because again, Sanchez was apparently in his prime at the time:

The thing that worries me is that Vicario, Lammens and Donnarumma get lauded while Sanchez gets lambasted and it clearly gets to his head. Whenever Sanchez has a bad game or makes a bad error, the media sh*tstorm is next-level and it clearly affects the whole team.

Despite the stats suggesting he's no worse than virtually all other keepers out there (which is an indictment on modern keepers, make no mistake), he has to go because his errors make for an outsized narrative compared to anyone else.

5 hours ago, Term_X said:

The goalkeeper market is atrocious and Martinez isn’t the answer. Seen mentions of Simon (of Bilbao) had a good World Cup, good with his feet/sweeping but shot stopping is just alright, and being a ‘basque’ player with ‘reportedly’ no release clause, they’ll want Kepa money. Probably why there’s been zero links of him going anywhere, that, and the fact he simply isn’t elite.

And once an ‘elite’ keeper emerges… we’ll have competition from Real Madrid and others for such a talent, given the ages of the only decent keepers around these days being 30+.

Sigh.

There is this idea that we have to only buy an elite keeper which I disagree with.

We don't have to buy someone elite, we just need someone better than Sanchez until that elite talent emerges. At least someone that makes the routine saves and can catch aerial balls.

16 minutes ago, Deino said:

There is this idea that we have to only buy an elite keeper which I disagree with.

We don't have to buy someone elite, we just need someone better than Sanchez until that elite talent emerges. At least someone that makes the routine saves and can catch aerial balls.

Sanchez is one of the best in the league in the air. It doesn't mean he's good, it means the state of the goalkeeper market is abysmal.

So one problem is that we have to replace Sanchez with someone appropriately 'elite' because everyone else is just as bad if not worse, and another problem is that the goalkeeper market is so bad that even an 'elite' replacement will only be marginally better.

1 hour ago, SydneyChelsea said:

Little piece on Emi Martinez from mid last-season, when Sanchez was looking great at the time and Aston Villa were flying high. Martinez and his propensity for errors was seen as their weakness.

Butt his graph was pretty damning because again, Sanchez was apparently in his prime at the time:

The thing that worries me is that Vicario, Lammens and Donnarumma get lauded while Sanchez gets lambasted and it clearly gets to his head. Whenever Sanchez has a bad game or makes a bad error, the media sh*tstorm is next-level and it clearly affects the whole team.

Despite the stats suggesting he's no worse than virtually all other keepers out there (which is an indictment on modern keepers, make no mistake), he has to go because his errors make for an outsized narrative compared to anyone else.

This is because Sanchez had such a monumentally awful 24/25 that no one could believe his 25/26 was not also awful. So the moment he has a bad game everyone acts like it happens every week.

Sanchez looks like he has stopped playing out from the back, which his howlers generally come from. Both goals at Fulham were mishandling/not handling errors whereas shot stopping has been a stronger area of his game. If this is a blip maybe we get by. That said he didnt look that safe with a few other shots in the Fulham game.

He wasnt good enough prior to Fulham and he still isnt. We dont win the league with Sanchez.

Alonso doesnt seem overly concerned...yet

An opportunistic Keeper purchase and hes done imo.

Edited 42 minutes ago42 min by OTL