Karius career not defined by howlers but Newcastle final shouldn't be about him
It's funny how one or two games can define a player’s career - especially if they’re a goalkeeper.
I was thinking this earlier in the week when it became clear Loris Karius would be Newcastle’s likely starter for the Carabao Cup final. And I was also thinking I wouldn’t have been a keeper even if I’d been a foot taller! We all know about Karius’s last game for Liverpool, his disaster in the Champions League Cup final, when he made two - possibly concussion inspired - mistakes against Real Madrid. But can you tell me his record before that?
No? Well I’ll help you. He had 12 clean sheets in his last 20 games for my former club. Not quite so calamitous, is it? No one remembers of course, because that’s the life of a keeper - a mistake that costs a huge game and you’re branded for life.
As a striker, it’s just not the same. Yes, you can have a howler, but if you score in the next game everyone forgets. I missed plenty, but I’m not defined by them.
But goalkeepers are a different matter. Jim Leighton had a magnificent career, but his FA Cup 1990 FA Cup final defined him. Dropped for the replay, he only played one more game for Manchester United.
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Closer to home, you could argue David James is still remembered for a few errors that eventually cost him his career at Anfield. Yet do you know how many games he played for England after he left? One? Two? Nope. 52.
He only won one England cap while a Liverpool player, yet people still talk about his time there as defining his career. What they probably mean is a couple of errors - and usually cite the two against Manchester United in that 3-1 defeat when the winner would probably have taken the title in 1997.
Loris Karius had a nightmare against Real Madrid in 2018 (Getty Images)The same with Sander Westerveld, who made a mistake at Bolton in 2001 and our manager Gerard Houllier went out and bought not one but two keepers to replace him literally three days later!
With Karius, I know it’s different, because his career took a dive (forgive the pun) off a cliff after that final, so he’s going to be the focal point of the final as he’s come in from third choice to be a likely starter.
If he fails, it’ll be ‘the clown’ all over again, if he doesn’t then it’s redemption. But you know what, Newcastle’s players and especially their fans have to make sure it’s not a game that is all about him.
The story is them getting to their first final since the 1990s, or winning their first trophy since the Intercities Fairs’ Cup in 1969, (and no, I’m definitely not counting the bloomin’ InterToto Cup and its 11 ‘winners’ in 2006!!)
I hate to say it, but it’s never about one person. It’s a great story yeah, if he proves the hero, and a sad one if he makes a costly mistake, but it’s never about a single player - not even that Champions League final was…and I’m including Gareth Bale in that!
It’s not all about Marcus Rashford either, so it shouldn’t matter to Manchester United if he’s ruled out with injury. I think he’s been massively important to them this season, but they’ve gone past relying on one person now.
Loris Karius will start for Newcastle against Man Utd (Serena Taylor/Newcastle United via Getty Images)It’s funny, because you look back to last season and he had a torrid time. His own fans were saying he should have been sold, he was a waste of space and all those things. Now, he’s the greatest striker on the planet.
If he’d been a keeper that would probably have been it, but as a striker he was able to score a few goals to get his confidence back, and become quite probably the Europe’s most in form forward, alongside Vinicius Junior at the moment.
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I’m glad Karius has been given this chance. After the tough time he’s been through it’s good to see. But c’mon. This final had nothing to do with him until a few days ago.
What about the team’s transformation under Eddie Howe. What about the story behind that? That very definitely belongs to the lot of them, and if I were their management or their fans, I’d be making sure that is the tale that defines them.
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