The two men fighting arguably the most direct battle for an England World Cup shirt are pitched into battle at St James’ Park tomorrow night.
While one boasts the best defensive record in the league, he recently made a key mistake for England, while the other has been Southgate’s trusted first choice for four years.
But how do this season’s detailed statistics rate the credentials of Newcastle’s Nick Pope and Everton’s Jordan Pickford to be first on the teamsheet in Qatar?
Pope has conceded just nine goals in his first 10 top-flight games for United and kept four clean sheets in marshalling this season’s meanest Premier League defence.
But despite Everton’s inconsistent form, Pickford is right behind him, having conceded just 11 goals despite registering only one shut-out. Where does Pope stand out? Shot-stopping. His PSxG-GA of +0.23 puts him in the top 3% of keepers in Europe’s top five leagues.
PSxG is expected goals based on how likely a keeper is to save a shot, while GA is goals they have actually conceded. So a higher PSxG-GA score reflects better performance – and Pope is well ahead of Pickford, whose 0.11 score only puts him in the top 23% keepers in those top five leagues.
However, on the simpler metric of save percentages, the two men have been near-identical this season, with Pope averaging 81.4% and Pickford 81.3%.
But another area of strength for £10m summer signing Pope is his willingness to come off his line and play the sweeper keeper role. His 1.74 defensive actions outside of the penalty area per game put him in the top 1% of keepers across the top leagues.
Predictably, though, Pickford has a significant edge on Pope in kicking stats in open play, having completed 60.7% of long passes (40-plus yards) this season compared with Pope’s 45.3%.
Pickford is also currently attempting more passes per game (26.9) than Pope (20.3), underlining the Washington-born former Sunderland man is more comfortable with the moving ball at his feet. Dead ball-wise, though, Pope compares much better, completing 73.6% of long goal kicks to Pickford’s 74.1%.
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