Newcastle United fans may be confused as to why Karl Darlow was not selected for Gareth Southgate’s England squad earlier today.After a strong start to the campaign, there were suggestions the national set-up were looking at the 30-year-old in what has been a reasonably problematic position for the Three Lions.Jordan Pickford was recently dropped by Everton while Dean Henderson is yet to enjoy a sustained run in the Manchester United team with Nick Pope and his Burnley side also struggling this season.So, the fact Southgate today claimed (relayed by Lee Ryder below) that no one was pushing Pickford enough to claim a spot in the starting line-up seems somewhat baffling.
Indeed, no ‘keeper has saved more shots than Darlow this season (38) or won as many aerial duels (12).
While he may not enjoy quite the same reputation Pickford does when it comes to distribution, he boasts a better passing accuracy than the Everton man and Nick Pope this season with 79.46% to 75.94% and 79.09% respectively.
Perhaps you could argue that playing safe passes into the central defenders is always likely to boost your percentage, but the types of passes Darlow is offering should be noted too.
Pickford has made only one final third pass more than him (10 to 9) while his 51 long passes beats the former Sunderland stopper by sixteen.
In terms of goalkeeper exits - where the man between the posts comes off his line to attempt or claim the ball - Darlow is again the highest in league with 24 compared to Pickford's ten and Pope's eight.
With that in mind, Darlow can certainly feel hard done by. Not usually a regular starter at Newcastle and drafted in to cover for Martin Dubravka, he's pretty much in the form of his life right now and is outdoing the competition in almost every goalkeeping metric.
Callum Wilson, the second highest goal scorer available for England selection in the league also missed out, so the feelings of bias sections of Newcastle fans have when it comes to Gareth Southgate are unlikely to subside.