Gavin Bazunu G Standard Liege (loan from Southampton) b.2002

[pineapple stu]

This season, plus 6 for Rovers.

[John83]

Travers has 17 senior appearances. Bazunu has 32.
I hesitate to defend BI, but I read his post as meaning Bazunu was lucky not to also be caught, and therefore the experience being called for was neither of them.

[nigel-harps1954]

This season, plus 6 for Rovers.

That's what I mean, Bazunu has 32 appearances this season. He had 6 league appearances and a couple of European appearances for Shamrock Rovers.

[pineapple stu]

I hesitate to defend BI, but I read his post as meaning Bazunu was lucky not to also be caught, and therefore the experience being called for was neither of them.
I think you're right - but then his experienced keeper is Seán McDermott of Kristiansund, who's played six games in the past 18 months...


That's what I mean, Bazunu has 32 appearances this season. He had 6 league appearances and a couple of European appearances for Shamrock Rovers.
4 league appearances and 2 Euro per soccerway (which I took my figures from)?

[tetsujin1979]

38 according Wikipedia as well
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gavin_Bazunu#Career_statistics

[Eirambler]

Burton (Managed by Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink) apparently want to take Bazunu on loan for next season. Would put him in competition with Kieran O'Hara for a place in the starting eleven, although you'd certainly fancy Bazunu to win that battle.

[Trequartista20]

Likely to go out on loan again next season, potentially at a higher level:

https://www.the42.ie/gavin-bazunu-4-5459187-Jun2021/

[Trequartista20]

Being linked with a loan move to Portsmouth as a replacement for the departing Craig MacGillivray.

https://extra.ie/2021/06/20/sport/soccernews/portsmouth-bazunu

[tommy_c12000]

Ideally he can get a club close to Manchester to enable him to continue to train a couple of days a week at one of the worlds best clubs. That was the plan at rochdale given the proximity to Manchester but COVID wrecked that. Portsmouth too far away. Championship loan close to Manchester would be the perfect scenario. The regular on site presence at Manchester city would be important and allow coaching staff to monitor him closely and iron out any bad habits he’s developing in the lower leagues

[Demesne Lad]

Several sources (Hampshire Live, FLW, Pundit Arena) claiming this pm that Man City and Pompey have agreed the loan signing.

[pineapple stu]

Portsmouth are a bit of a strange one - their keeper was Player of the Year last year, and an ever-present. Had been with the club three seasons, played 135 games, called up by Scotland - and then got released on a free, only to join Charlton, who had finished literally one place about them in the league. It'd be interesting to know why they did that - it seems they were unable to agree a new deal, but you'd hardly imagine Charlton would be offering much more than Portsmouth as they're both similar-sized clubs. Is it that he was a big earner and they felt his salary would be better apportioned across a squad? But then he signed from Shrewsbury three years ago; you'd have thought they'd have had bigger earners.

They've only one keeper left after the summer, and the manager has said (https://www.portsmouth.co.uk/sport/football/portsmouth-fc/danny-cowley-reveals-portsmouth-plans-for-alex-bass-as-he-overhauls-goalkeeping-department-3246758) the reserve keeper (who was first-choice for a few months in 2019/20) has a "great opportunity" to re-establish himself as number 1 (but then he would say that) and that he was looking to bring in two new keepers, including a youngster as third choice (and you would hope that's not going to be Bazunu!)

August/September will be interesting anyway if Gavin does go there.

[tommy_c12000]

Surely he has assurances that he will start as number 1, otherwise it’s quite a foolish move. No doubt game time is incorporated into his loan conditions and Man City won’t be long recalling him if he spends a protracted amount of time on bench. Good move, only downside is he won’t be able to spend regular time with the top class coaches at man city to help fine tune things. He’s taking the opposite route to development compared to Caoimhin!! Best of luck to him!

[pineapple stu]

Yeah, it's hard to see he'd be the number 3 alright. I think even if you got assurances of being number 1, a keeper is often just a couple of blunders away from the bench. Bazunu knows this of course, and Portsmouth did the same thing in 19/20.

The other concern about releasing your PotY of course is is it financial? They've had a big churn and if it's for financial reasons (due to covid say) then they may struggle. And that wouldn't be great either.

But lookit - time will tell!

[Razors left peg]

Im disappointed with this move. I would have expected him to get a Championship move after getting the International caps, you would expect that would boost his profile a bit more.

[pineapple stu]

He's made too many errors to be disappointed at not moving up a division.

He was dropped by Rochdale like. Championship clubs won't like that.

We need perspective here. If he can get a full season at Portsmouth, he'll have done very well for himself.

[Olé Olé]

Yeah. I'd take that. Much better side then Rochdale even within that context and surely their defence is far better.

[Razors left peg]

He's made too many errors to be disappointed at not moving up a division.

He was dropped by Rochdale like. Championship clubs won't like that.

We need perspective here. If he can get a full season at Portsmouth, he'll have done very well for himself.

You've been consistent with your opinion on him Stu thats for sure :) It reminds me a bit of my opinion of Idah a few years ago, I really didnt see the hype. I've changed that now, I think hes going to be a good player.

[pineapple stu]

He has great potential, for sure. But right now there's no point pretending he's a Championship-standard keeper. He's shown nothing to indicate that. Which is fine, cos he's only 19 yet.

Championship managers seem to agree :)

[Razors left peg]

He has great potential, for sure. But right now there's no point pretending he's a Championship-standard keeper. He's shown nothing to indicate that. Which is fine, cos he's only 19 yet.

Championship managers seem to agree :)

I do think he could play in Championship easily, theres a lot of meh! in Championship

[pineapple stu]

I don't think anything we've seen of him could really back that up unfortunately. (In my view)

[Eirambler]

I don't think a Championship move was a realistic prospect for him this coming season unless he fancied being a likely number 2. It's easy to forget how young he is - there were no teenage first choice keepers in the Championship last season as far as I'm aware.

I think Portsmouth could be a good move for him, as long as he's going in as first choice. They're one of the better league one sides - realistically that was as good as he was going to get at this stage and it will be really good going for a 19 year old keeper if he's a regular at Portsmouth next season.

[yurt]

I think Pompey is an excellent move for him. To go from an unfancied L1 team to a promotion contender, it has to be considered progress.

If he can establish himself in a winning team who plays out from the back it will be huge for his development. If Bazunu gets 40+ games this season with Randolph and Kelleher only getting a handful of games as #2, he could easily jump the pecking order for Ireland

[John83]

https://www.rte.ie/sport/soccer/2021/0701/1232550-ireland-keeper-bazunu-joins-portsmouth-on-loan/

[Olé Olé]

https://www.rte.ie/sport/soccer/2021/0701/1232550-ireland-keeper-bazunu-joins-portsmouth-on-loan/

I like those quotes from the manager. Clearly rates him and has done his homework. I wasn't aware of that point regarding most saves.

On a sidenote, it looks like Bazunu's manager at Rochdale followed him back City's under 23 side- young Barry Murphy lined up to take over as manager. Interesting move and maybe good work with the likes of Bazunu has contributed to the appointment.

[pineapple stu]

On the bench tonight for the EFL Cup game against Millwall. Alex Bass, the reserve from last season, starts, as he did in the league opener on Saturday, keeping a clean sheet.

That's disappointing.

[Olé Olé]

He has been recovering from an injury. Surely he would have started tonight in an EFL Cup game were he 100% fit given that Bass started at the weekend in the league?

[pineapple stu]

He was on the bench both times, so he's presumably mostly over the injury and, yeah, as you say, an EFL Cup game would be an ideal time for a run-out on the way back from injury.

He has the number 1 jersey for this year, but Bass has kept the same number (35) from last year. It's hard to judge a manager's mind from squad numbers these days.

Best case scenario though is he's going to be missing games ahead of the qualifiers in September, and it looks like we won't have a regular starter to play in nets (if we assume Travers is behind Randolph/Kelleher/Bazunu)

[John83]

That's pretty much the situation we were in a year ago, except now at least we have some confidence in the alternatives to Randolph.

[pineapple stu]

Yeah, that's true - although I suppose with young players, being in the same situation we were a year ago is always a bit disappointing.

[pineapple stu]

Starts today at least. One of four changes

[ontheotherhand]

Glowing reports so far from his 2 games at Portsmouth. 2 clean sheets and a worldy of a save today. Probably not as good as it looked though eh stu?

[pineapple stu]

Hard to know from the link you didn't provide!

[liamoo11]

God we really are lucky to have bazunu and kelleher. That ability to play 10 yards outside your box and be comfortable with such a high starting position will be so helpful to us to let us push our defence higher to allow our midfield actually close the space to our front players. Randolph has been a super keeper but he just can't do that and his deep starting position encourages the likes of Duffy to sit way too deep(for his own comfort) dragging everyone else deeper and leaving us with no obvious attacking threat

[Kingdom]

God we really are lucky to have bazunu and kelleher. That ability to play 10 yards outside your box and be comfortable with such a high starting position will be so helpful to us to let us push our defence higher to allow our midfield actually close the space to our front players. Randolph has been a super keeper but he just can't do that and his deep starting position encourages the likes of Duffy to sit way too deep(for his own comfort) dragging everyone else deeper and leaving us with no obvious attacking threat

Agree totally Liamoo. The combination of a goalkeeper uncomfortable off his goal-line, and defenders that are prone to sitting deep (for different reasons - comfort, speed (lack of), poor turning) is something we've struggled with for many years, and has been a massive reason (for me) in how we've ended up in the position we are in.

[Kingdom]

Hard to know from the link you didn't provide!

1427732532133511172

Excellent one-handed save, but the forward (sort of looks like Jonnie Williams) should have finished the rebound.

[pineapple stu]

Tweet is gone now I think?

[ontheotherhand]

Hard to know from the link you didn't provide!

I assumed you'd seen it. You're usually right up to speed stu. Reports say he didn't have much to save in the first game but was pivotal in moving the ball for them. Second game sounds like he was a lot busier and made some good saves. Portsmouth forum is full of praise so far. Early days though of course. Hopefully he keeps it up and Kelleher gets a few cup runs as first choice. Then we will have 3 good keepers, 2-3 good right backs and.......that's about it for the foreseeable future........

https://twitter.com/carlofooty/status/1427732532133511172?s=20

[John83]

Looks a very good save. I hope he has a great season and starts to fulfil his undoubted potential.

[pineapple stu]

I assumed you'd seen it. You're usually right up to speed stu.
I get my info from here otoh! :)

It's a good save alright. I'd be more interested to see if he's ironed out the decision making/distribution errors from his game though. I know from personal experience a couple of good saves very quickly get forgotten when a rush of blood comes along to cost a goal.

But he's six months older than the last qualifiers and is (I presume!) still improving, so touch wood we'll see that come through in his performances over the next while. From what I've seen in an Ireland jersey, I'd still have Kelleher to start next month, but Kelleher needs games and Kenny has already said League One isn't international level. Making exceptions for teenagers like Bazunu and Parrott is fair enough of course, but I think we're still a year away from where we could really call the keeper crisis over.

[ontheotherhand]

I get my info from here otoh! :)

It's a good save alright. I'd be more interested to see if he's ironed out the decision making/distribution errors from his game though. I know from personal experience a couple of good saves very quickly get forgotten when a rush of blood comes along to cost a goal.

But he's six months older than the last qualifiers and is (I presume!) still improving, so touch wood we'll see that come through in his performances over the next while. From what I've seen in an Ireland jersey, I'd still have Kelleher to start next month, but Kelleher needs games and Kenny has already said League One isn't international level. Making exceptions for teenagers like Bazunu and Parrott is fair enough of course, but I think we're still a year away from where we could really call the keeper crisis over.

Yeah all fair although if Randolph is available we don't have a keeper crisis for me. I wish he played more but he hasn't let us down. As I said before I think we were just judging Bazunu with a different set of criteria i.e. as a prospect versus a nailed on starter. Signs are bright though. And young Parrot seems to be finding a level he can get games and goals at as well.

[pineapple stu]

Yeah, good point on Randolph. He's an interesting one. He's one of those fairly middling club players who's always been excellent for us. But 10 club games in the past 18 months isn't enough - no more than it's enough for Kelleher - and yeah, there's the worry (sorry Kingdom!) that he's a bit Packie Bonner-like with the ball at his feet.

I think if you view Bazunu and Kelleher as prospects, then it makes sense to start Randolph in Portugal - yet I'd be less comfortable about it than usual. (Also, you can't rule out Travers, who's starting for Bournemouth a division higher)

And yeah, as you say, if we have a couple of keepers and a couple of full-backs - and let's add in Parrott there to make us feel good - then that's still a poor team. We still need a few other players to come through.

[Eirambler]

We're looking good at centre back as well if that helps. Midfield remains the big issue and has been for a while.

[paul_oshea]

I'm not sure if Randolph has let us down but I feel there were times when he could have done better for us. So I'm not really bothered at this stage who plays in goals especially as we don't have anything to play for again and missed out on two campaigns.

[OwlsFan]

OK Mr. Cynical here. I have been watching football a long time and some of the stuff I've read and heard about Gavin is a bit ott. He's pretty much made at least one almost fatal error in each of the last three games and arguably might have saved the Serbian goal. Some great saves in between and I love the way he's not stuck to his line for corners and gets out to punch the ball clear but he's still only learning his trade and has got to cut out those mistakes because if we concede a goal as a result, we'll struggle to score 2 in most games. Great prospect but not the finished article and I hope Kelleher is also given a chance to show what he can also do.

[Fixer82]

I really like Bazunu but I've felt, having watched both, that Kelleher seems less likely to make a mistake with ball at feet.
Both great to have coming through though. If only we had such talent up front to choose from.

[seanfhear]

Bazunu has that bit of a feel of a Lucky General that Napoleon Bonaparte was so fond of. He could have given up 2 or 3 goals if he did not have that lucky goalkeeping bit going for him. Mind you he hasn’t let the slip ups affect him.

I must say though that like Napoleon with Lucky Generals I like Lucky Goalkeepers and Lucky Players overall.

[Trequartista20]

I really like Bazunu, he certainly has something about him. It's a long time since I last had such a positive feeling about a young Irish goalkeeping prospect, inconsistent and occasionally slightly lacking judgment though he may be

Would you describe Kenny as a lucky general?

I wouldn't have said so at all before, but his luck certainly seems to have turned with the really rather fortuitous home draws with Azerbaijan and Serbia that have probably kept him in a job.

[seanfhear]

I really like Bazunu, he certainly has something about him. It's a long time since I last had such a positive feeling about a young Irish goalkeeping prospect, inconsistent and occasionally slightly lacking judgment though he may be

Would you describe Kenny as a lucky general?

I wouldn't have said so at all before, but his luck certainly seems to have turned with the really rather fortuitous home draws with Azerbaijan and Serbia that have probably kept him in a job.
Kenny must be a bit lucky that the FAI are completely on their Uppers. His position would be under much more immediate threat if they had some cash.

[Trequartista20]

How many times have we conceded the first goal under Kenny? Even against Azerbaijan, Luxembourg and Andorra this has been the case.

I'd love to see us score the first goal in the next round of games and hopefully the confidence will flow and maybe we'll really see what we're made of. Something's still holding us back.

I do agree that Kenny has, thus far, faced an incredibly placid and patient media.

Who knows what Kerr and Staunton, also billed as a progressive and transitional team-builder for the future, might have achieved were they afforded a similar luxury, rather than the brickbats and derision directed their way.

You can't help but recall Steve Staunton's tenure when considering Kenny, and I always felt Staunton was unlucky in the way that his appointed mentor, Bobby Robson, fell so seriously unwell. This isn't remembered now, and instead that great servant, 'Stan', was reduced to a figure of fun, and never quite recovered. Sad.

[tetsujin1979]

we've only been in the lead three times in Kenny's reign so far - Serbia, Andorra, and Portugal - and we lost two of those games.