Jordan Pickford's absence from Gareth Southgate’s England squad for the upcoming Nations League matches against Italy and Germany has handed Nick Pope, Aaron Ramsdale and Dean Henderson the ideal platform to challenge the Everton goalkeeper's first-choice status - or at very least shore up the number two spot.
Henderson has managed to emerge from Nottingham Forest’s tough start to the season with plenty of praise, despite his side having conceded the third-highest number of goals in the Premier League (17). Yet it’s largely accepted that at this stage of his career, he’s trumped by the experience and ability of Pope and Ramsdale.
Southgate has avoided officially anointing a number two shot-stopper so far, and it may prove tough to do so based on the limited opportunities they will have over the international break. Therefore, it's likely that club form will be factored into the England manager’s decision, and based on that, there’s a case to be made that Pope might just be edging his Arsenal rival.
Newcastle boss Eddie Howe spoke glowingly for the former Burnley man, who arrived this summer, stating he’s already had a really positive impact on his team despite the short period of time he’s been at the club.
Howe said of Pope: “He’s shown already for us this year how good he can be. He has kept goal so well – his distribution, his crosses, his shot-stopping have been of the highest level. I can’t speak highly enough of him.
“But also as a character, the players love him. He’s a very funny guy, he’s got a very dry sense of humour, he’s got a big presence – when he walks into a room you know he’s there. He’s very popular and he’s settled really well.”
Howe’s words are backed up in the underlying numbers, particularly when it comes to shot-stopping. According to FBref, Newcastle with Pope in-between the sticks have a combined post-shot expected goals (PSxG) of 9.4 this season.
Who should be number one for England at the World Cup? Have your say in the comments!
PSxG is essentially a measurement of chance quality. It assigns a value to a shot in terms of how likely it is to lead to a goal, utilising information such as shooting location, body part and assist type.
But unlike traditional xG, but it also takes into consideration shot characteristics after the ball has been struck, such as its trajectory and whether it was on target or not - all own-goal strikes, shots off target or ones that are blocked are assigned a value of 0.
In Pope's case, this means that he would have been expected to concede between nine and 10 goals goals this season, based on the shots he has faced. Therefore, his actual total of seven conceded represents an over-performance of +2.4.
That’s actually the second-best over-performance in the division, coincidently behind only Everton's Jordan Pickford with +3.9. That shows in some way just how good the Toffees man has been for Frank Lampard’s side this season, and why Southgate will rely on him returning to fitness ahead of the World Cup.
Arsenal's Ramsdale ranks less impressively, with an underperformance of -1.9. Mikel Arteta has tipped the former Bournemouth man to dislodge Pickford for England’s opening game in Qatar in November, but the above hints that he may need to show more to Southgate if the England manager is to share the Spaniard's opinion.
