Whoever thought Bravo's injury would be a blessing for TS confidence is having second thoughts.
I mentioned it at the time that Bravo's injury came at a wrong time for stegen (given the kind of games awaiting him). He's been a victim of circumstances and technical failings on his part.
Stegen's Barca career was always doomed when injury struck him pre-season of last year. It meant that he had to make his debut in the CL, his sec game being against PSG, where Barca had a stinker. Given his sporadic game time, he did commendably well, and helped in the context of team play and results, but such a start to his Barca career never helped his individual game. So whilst he's won 2 trophies, he hasn't progressed in gking terms. And one can't build anything concrete in the absence of a stable and consistent base, one which can't be estd without weekly game time.
His debut in both CL and LL were accidental, not a natural transition. And what we are witnessing is its cumulative effect. The resulting constant media scrutiny and statistical comparisons (without context) is heaping more pressure, and painting him as a bigger liability than he is at the moment, and some fans always love an easy scapegoat.
And since we love comparing our keepers. Malaga created few very good chances, one of which was their forward missing a point blank shot towards the end of the game. But Bravo came out with a clean sheet to his credit. So if even the supposed communication between him and the defense is better, he couldn't avert malaga from creating danger. I have seen the missed chances on the opp. part when Bravo is in goal attributed to Bravo's indomitable aura. Now if that were true for this season, it still doesn't explain the same occurrences against Villarreal last season (bravo's sec game), when their players hit the post a couple of times. This was at a time when he still hadn't built the
clean sheet king reputation. Likewise, there were various other similar instances where the opp. missed an easy tap-in or hit the post. The psychological component can't explain it all.
Personally, Bravo has been luckier despite faring better in pure gking terms. If he was the one injured even before his Barca career began, things could have been looking differently for both.
What stegen needs now is a easy run of games, a substantial one from which to derive confidence from. In the absence of which, a transfer is the only reasonable option for all parties concerned.
But I can also guarantee that if we brought someone like DDG to replace MAtS, and the former was given the bulk of gametime, it would then be Bravo who would suffer a dip in his performances, and I suspect a lot of his advocates would then be using the same excuse that they tend to frown at when it's applied to MAtS.
The Keylor comparison isn't a good one. I thought it was obvious. I could explain but I rather not over-invest myself on this one.
