The Premier League plays host to many of the world’s best goalkeepers.
‘Goals prevented‘ statistic
However, who has been the shot-stopping king to top them all this season? Well, naturally, that’s a complicated question, but one that we can come a lot closer to answering through statistics.
And while it might make you skeptical at first, seeing how goalkeepers have performed against the expected goals they were meant to concede is one of the best ways to judge number ones.
Officially phrased as xGOT (expected goals on target), the metric shows the total of goals that a shot-stopper is expected to have conceded based on the quality of the shots that they’ve faced.
So, when you compare that number to how many goals that they actually conceded, you can find out the total of goals they prevented or on the flip side, the tally of goals they let in that they should have stopped.
Premier League Goalkeepers ranked:
22. Kasper Schmeichel (Leicester City): -6.7 21. Nick Pope (Burnley): -6.6 20. Karl Darlow (Newcastle United): -5.5 19. Tim Krul (Norwich City): -5 18. Daniel Bachmann (Watford): -4 17. Alex McCarthy (Southampton): -3.9 16. Vicente Guaita (Crystal Palace): -3.
15. Jordan Pickford (Everton): -2.8 14. Ben Foster (Watford): -2 13. David Raya (Brentford): -1.9 =11. Alvaro Fernández (Brentford): -1.7 =11. Illan Meslier (Leeds United): -1.7
10. Emiliano Martinez (Aston Villa): -1.3 9. Lukasz Fabianski (West Ham United): -0.4 8. David de Gea (Manchester United): -0.2 7. Hugo Lloris (Tottenham Hotspur): -0.1 =5. Ederson (Manchester City): 0.4 =5. Alisson Becker (Liverpool): 0.4 4. Robert Sánchez (Brighton & Hove Albion): 0.6 3. Aaron Ramsdale (Arsenal): 2 2. Edouard Mendy (Chelsea): 2.5
1. Jose Sa (Wolverhampton Wanderers): 3.7
Sa takes the number one spot
It’s fair to say that swapping Rui Patricio for Sa didn’t work out too badly for Wolves, right?
Besides, the statistics largely conform with the eye test as fans have been very complimentary of Mendy and Ramsdale all season long, so it’s a credit to Sa that he outperforms both of them.
Preventing more than three shots on target that the data suggests would ordinarily have been scored is a massive compliment to a goalkeeper’s ability to produce heroic dives and denials.