Being a Barça keeper is a tough task, especially in recent years. Inspired by this excellent article, I will share some of my thoughts on ter Stegen below.
For me, the main issue with how people evaluate ter Stegen is a lack of perspective. They magnify his mistakes and stretch them over years and years, while seemingly ignoring, not his strengths, but his truly world class abilities.
This happens with all top footballers to a certain extent, but I feel like ter Stegen gets it worse. I just want to try to put some things into perspective.
MATS is a keeper who has outperformed his post-shot expected goals conceded by 12.4 (0.09 per 90 minutes) in La Liga since 2017/18. He had one down season in 2019/20 in which he underperformed by 0.03 per 90.
The down years for the likes of Neuer (underperformance by 0.22 per 90 in 2018/19), Courtois (by 0.13 in 2018/19), and Ederson (by 0.07 in 2017/18) have all seen worse.
In the Champions league, too, ter Stegen has consistently outperformed at a high rate. He was at +0.12 per 90 in 2018/19, +0.23 per 90 in 2019/20, and +0.14 per 90 in 2020/21, conceding a total of 3.9 fewer goals than he would be expected to concede.
MATS is also someone who consistently puts up elite passing numbers. His launched pass (40+ yards) completion rate in 2017/18 was 10th out of 110 big five league keepers. In 2018/19 he was 6th out of 113. In 2019/20 he was 1st out of 108. This season he is 2nd out of 109.
Taking ter Stegen’s mix of skills into account, there are maybe two, maybe three, keepers out there who you could start to argue would be better in the context demanded at Barcelona. Even then, there are keepers who are good with their feet and pass...
...the ball a lot, but have never been asked to do some of the things ter Stegen does on a consistent basis. This does not mean ter Stegen is necessarily a top 2-3 keeper in the world, but in terms of how they would perform at Barça, almost nobody has the profile to match him.
Omar has informed me that these are ter Stegen’s percentile ranks for the above chart:
Shot Stopping: 89.4
Long Passing: 98:6
Sweeping: 59.9
The metric for sweeping is particularly imperfect, but I think this paints the picture well.
Shot Stopping: 89.4
Long Passing: 98:6
Sweeping: 59.9
The metric for sweeping is particularly imperfect, but I think this paints the picture well.
MATS is an elite shot stopper (especially in 1 vs. 1 situations I believe, which has been crucial) and distributor, while just an above average sweeper.
Now, this is where we can start to get into some fair criticisms of ter Stegen. Are there times when he fails to come out and sweep fast enough? Absolutely.
As Albert mentioned in the article, part of this is because ter Stegen trusts his exceptional reflexes and 1 vs. 1 technique, but I think it is safe to say that sweeping is the area of his game that lags most behind the rest.
So, if you are looking for the relative weakness in ter Stegen’s profile, or talking about what he could look to improve upon, sweeping is a fair point.
Now, I just want to cover a couple reasons why I think ter Stegen tends to get too much stick. First would be the misperceptions regarding the mentality of a footballer, and how they must go about displaying that mentality.
ter Stegen is not someone who is loud, outspoken, and very open with his expressions on the pitch. He does not really scream and bark orders and celebrate wildly in the old-fashioned passionate sense.
He is far more reserved, not introverted and lacking a command over his back line, but just choosing to express himself in a different way.
You can probably tell where I am going with this, but this is different to how Víctor Valdés was. The two conduct themselves in some contrasting ways, and since Valdés came first, became a club legend, and was a member of the club’s most successful era, this can put a stain on...
… anything ter Stegen does that is different. Obviously, leadership and passion can come out in different ways, but I just do not feel like ter Stegen gets the benefit of the doubt that others (ie Messi) who conduct themselves in a non-traditional manner get.
MATS is focused, calm under pressure, confident, he takes responsibility, and he does not complain about the cycle of aging, injury-prone, or non-technically gifted defenders he has had to line up behind throughout his tenure, while continuing to put up high quality performances.
The other thing that I think hurts ter Stegen a lot is the classic overemphasis on individual performances, or even just moments, or even just team results in high-variance settings.
Over the course of the 2018/19 Champions League semi final tie against Liverpool, ter Stegen faced shots worth a total of 3.2 PSxG, he ended up conceding 4. Could he have done better? Yes, especially on Liverpool’s second goal I feel, but he was still expected to concede 3…
… and with how the team was crumbling, it was a matter of when, not if, Liverpool went ahead.
Against Bayern last season, ter Stegen faced a PSxG of 6.4. It should go without saying that if he managed to only let in 7 or 6 it would not have made any difference whatsoever, and his performance probably would not be perceived any differently as well.
I have already mentioned that MATS has consistently outperformed with his shot stopping over Champions League campaigns as a whole, but these singular, high-variance matches where Barça collectively imploded seem to be valued disproportionately by many.
Basically, as I said, people seem to lack perspective with ter Stegen. There is a lot of nostalgia, outcome bias, selective memory, and overemphasis on individual matches involved.
It is fine to point out his weaker areas, which do exist, and acknowledge when he has a poor performance, but do so with maturity.
Something that came up in Albert’s piece was the status of ter Stegen as a Barça legend. Is he one? That is not something I can decide - we all can have different definitions, and others certainly have more knowledge of the club’s full history than me.
Furthermore, as crazy as it may sound, the German’s Barça career might not even be halfway done yet. Who can say what the next six seasons (or more) will bring?
What I will say, though, is that ter Stegen has won everything there is to win in a Barça shirt and has remained a key piece in the squad through a period of extreme turmoil.
If we had Neuer, fans would be incredibly upset with some of his shot-stopping form. If we had Alisson, fans would go crazy with his misplaced passes to our rivals that gave away goals. There will always be a desire for perfection, but just try to keep some things in perspective.
If you genuinely believe or spread some agenda that ter Stegen is trash - actually a bad goalkeeper in the sport of football - it should go without saying that is just irrational.
The goalkeeper position can serve as an easy scapegoat or way out for those who do not know or choose to ignore the true structural issues of a team. For some fans, this is because they really do not watch the team, yet still share their plethora of opinions for some reason…
…(maybe the club is very popular, good for likes, maybe it has become pretty memeable in recent seasons, etc.). For other fans, this is probably because of some factor out of the keeper’s control (their background, the fact they were not at the club in a certain past era, etc.).
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