Darren Bent says Alisson has made a lot of errors since joining Liverpool
Liverpool goalkeeper Alisson Becker has ‘made a lot of ricks’ since arriving at Anfield in 2018.
That’s the view of TalkSPORT pundit Darren Bent. A pretty bold claim, really. To be fair to the former England striker though, he did pre-face this by saying what a good signing the Brazilian has been for Liverpool.
[Alisson has been] Worth every penny,” he began. “Liverpool’s situation there they had Karius and Mignolet. They’ve had good goalkeepers, Dudek who won the Champions League of course, Pepe Reina, – good goalkeeper. But then Mignolet came in, didn’t do great, Karius – appalling. So I get it, they identified Alisson as being the one who could take them to the next level.
“Yes he’s made a lot ricks by the way – that have cost them goals, but there have been games where he’s pulled them out the fire where he’s made save upon save upon save. So it’s surprising that teams don’t say ‘you know what, let’s start with a goalkeeper. Let’s go out and spend £50m-60m on a goalkeeper and let them change our fortunes.’”
Alisson still one of the best around
In a way, Bent isn’t necessarily wrong here. It’s hard to argue too strongly otherwise when you watch Alisson’s error for the Wolves opener on Saturday evening.
But then, every goalkeeper has had a moment like that.
It seems a little far-fetched to claim that there have been ‘a lot’ of these incidents. And besides, Alisson has saved Liverpool so many goals over the years.
Most of these are things that you perhaps wouldn’t even notice. But when you compare the 30-year-old with his predecessors at Anfield, it’s like chalk and cheese.
All of Mignolet, Karius and even Dudek were guilty of letting soft goals slip past them. How many times did a goal go in against these ‘keepers and you thought to yourself ‘he could’ve done better there.’
With Alisson, that is rarely the case. He saves the difficult shots, but he also saves the medium ones that would beat the Mignolet’s and Karius’ of the world. If he’s beaten, the Brazilian usually can’t do a thing about it. That, or it’s a glaring error like the one on Saturday.
With that in mind, I challenge anyone to come up with three moments of similar sloppiness from Alisson. They simply do not exist. He’s up there with the very best in the world.
Perhaps the mistake against Wolves was just fresh in Bent’s mind as he made this statement. It was undoubtedly a poor moment that will linger in the memory. But the reason it sticks out is because it was so rare. There are players in this Liverpool team who are costing the Reds goals from game to game. Alisson isn’t one of them.
