I've also been sceptical about the high praise Bazunu's drawing here, and I just want to clarify that what I'm talking about is the here and now, and not his potential. He could be a great keeper yet. I think he isn't, and there's no shame in that at 19.
You can't spell failure without FAI
Well we disagree on the relative use of judging him on being ready or not right now. He's not playing now because he is ready, he's playing because we need him due our 1st and 2nd choices being out. The whole team is inexperienced and learning. His ceiling is much higher than the others in my (limited) opinion and he's only made easily fixed errors. Rushes of blood to the head as you say. He will go in, study the tape, be calmer next time etc. For the goals I'm sure he will work on his positioning. This is a lad who was studying Kieran Sadliers penalties on the bus to the Cork game...before saving one. He learns and applies.Originally Posted by pineapple stu
IF you were judging him more on his suitability to be #2 or 3 would you say he is ahead or behind Travers?
And yes of course I have a bias. I'm a huge fan of the kid. He was absolutely stellar for us. But maybe Rovers fans also know a bit more about him and see the errors as opportunities for growth rather than signs of weakness. The more he plays the fewer mistakes he will make...to a point of course...even Randolph makes enough errors that he doesn't actually even play first team football......
Bazunu way ahead of Travers for me. Travers had his big audition and cost us at least one goal, Bazunu didn't cost us any, made some decent saves and looked like a guy who will get better and better.
Absolutely. Add Westwood in there and it's our first three choices being out. That's a lot.
Is his ceiling higher than Travers/O'Hara? Probably is, yep. Will he study and learn from his mistakes? I'd bloody hope so. But that's all the future, and I've always been talking about the now. Well, it's now the recent past, in fact.
I said at the start of the week that I saw Travers, O'Hara and Bazunu as much of a muchness; I was worried about all of them. I don't think the relative views of Travers and Bazunu - one being slated and the other being highly praised - are an accurate reflection of their performances to be honest. Yes, Travers cost a goal, but Bazunu was lucky he didn't cost at least one. Is he better because the opposition were poorer and didn't take advantage? Would Serbia have teased bigger mistakes out of Bazunu?
If we take it that Westwood is kind of saying he's not really interested, then the squad for Portugal should in my view be Randolph (but I would like to see him starting at club level), Kelleher (he's in an unfortunate position of being number two at a top top club; he'll learn from that, but he could do with a loan spell) and...I don't know. The three remaining options are all lower League One level right now, and it's hard to put one above the other. Kenny has indirectly said (when commenting on McGeady) that League One isn't good enough, and I'd be inclined to agree. But the Portugal game is five months away, and the hope would be that all four young keepers will have kicked on by then - although O'Hara seems to have been dropped at Burton, which puts him at a distinct disadvantage. Where Bazunu and Travers will be by the time of the next match, I can't really say.
There's no option there that I'd be entirely happy with tbh. It's a poor squad we have at the moment, as I think has been said once or twice.
I'd be certain enough he knew what he was doing there! But yeah, overall he rode his luck. He even got away with a Bernd Leno pass straight to an Qatari player's feet. I like the cut of his jib though, so to speak.
Last edited by Stuttgart88; 31/03/2021 at 6:19 PM.
He has a couple of big brass ones, I'll give him that.
You can't spell failure without FAI
Travers and Bazunu have stuff to work on as our opposition showed them.
Bazunu's 19.. and there's lad writing him off.
19... and lads at Foot know more about his potential than top scouts/coaches at Man City..
In goalkeeping terms he's not just inexperienced.. he's a baby. It could be five years or more before he even gets back to City
But for now.. its pretty heartening to think we could have a goalkeeping choice between the City and Liverpool keeper in the near future
Show me one poster writing Bazunu off.
Whatever about anything else I think it was pretty clear the differences between Travers and Bazunu in presence alone. I said before Serbia game that their respective experience was irrelevant between them and I think that was shown to be true.
I think Bazunu if he was continued to be picked would give us a few years of heart attacks at times mixed with some brilliance. He definitely has something about him that is Star quality, I just wish we could stick him up front!
Belated thanks for this considered reply - a good read. Unfortunately I was entangled by the slings and arrows of the easily outraged at the time.
In response to pineapple_stu....
Hang on - Serbia played against Travers. So they teased what they could out of a rookie keeper. Travers was arguably at fault for two goals though I'd only blame him for one really- the lob. How is it relevant to ask a hypothetical question about Bazunu being in goals instead? You think Serbia would have targeted him more? For what it's worth I don't think he gets caught out for the lob, possibly even the header which he probably would have come flying out to claim.... We saw him save a more audacious but less predictable lob against Lux. He was backtracking as soon as it become a risk whereas Travers stayed rooted in no mans land. It was one of two or three great saves that night that seem to be getting forgotten for whatever reason. Far more positives to his performance than negatives for me that night. Qatar was a bit different as I think he took a few more risks but again I think he did well overall.
Playing in League 1 on loan doesn't always mean the player is League 1 level does it? You've brought up his goals conceded whilst he plays behind the worst team in that league as well. I'd class both as fairly irrelevant here. Buffon would concede if he was at Rochdale.
All in all though I think we are just judging him on different scales and reacting to different things i.e. you think he's being overly praised and I think he's being unfairly criticized...both can be true given the number of posts/opinions... I think he did really well for a 19 year old playing his first games in a ridiculously high pressure environment. I'd make him first choice to be honest. Randolph has bailed us out with some great saves but it's like playing a man down when we try to play it around the back. Kelleher might be the one but I haven't seen him play.
Last edited by ontheotherhand; 01/04/2021 at 2:04 AM. Reason: missing quote
When you reply with answers to questions that aren't asked, and showing little appreciation of the problems at hand, with zero indications of any solutions, you're not so much being entangled by the easily outraged, than distracting yourself while shaving the arrows.
Here they come! It’s the charge of the “Thanks” Brigade!
Don't you know that you are only allowed to "write off" or "over-hype" young Irish players?
My personal favourites are when people "write off" a player that they think is "over-hyped". There's a real skill to those posts.
On Bazunu, I don't think his performances were perfect and I think George Hamilton on Rte managed to "ooh" and "aah" every time Bazunu touched the ball. It was a bit much. But I think he did well for his age and experience so if he can take confidence and learnings from the experience then it's a win-win. He seems to have serious potential for a keeper of that age.
What were the unasked questions?
I think it's a little harsh on Travers. Though I agree Bazunu appeared to have the greater presence/confidence, there's no real comparison between what they had to deal with. Travers had a string of quality Tadic crosses coming towards 'his zone' basically from the off in Serbia, Bazunu could feel his way into the game against Luxembourg pretty comfortably, so no surprise he looked more assured. Maybe he would have regardless, but we don't know this.
Bazunu's mistakes were far worse than Travers', he was just lucky enough to get away with them, which changes the narrative completely as we know. He probably will be the better long-term option of the two but I certainly wouldn't be basing it on what we've seen over the past week to be honest.
It goes without saying that both are young and have their whole careers to improve, that really shouldn't need to be pointed out in every post without some posters jumping on it!
Because you specifically asked me to compare Bazunu and Travers. I said before the matches that they were both League One level keepers and I didn't see much between them. But if you ask the question, then I have to point out that there's not a lot I can go on by way of direct comparison - hence the point that Bazunu (who has made his own errors out of nothing, by and large) could well have played worse than Travers in the game we were under most pressure in.
Actually, that's no true on Travers - he started backtracking as soon as it became a risk too, but the issue was he'd strayed far too far off his line and couldn't get back in time. I don't agree the Lux lob was more audacious though. Mitrovic's lob was far better executed - the flight of the ball was lower, giving less time to react, and it was into the far corner, meaning the keeper had more distance to make up. But certainly Bazunu dealt better with that threat, sure.
They're not forgotten. Stutts put one of them down to luck actually. But keepers are there to make saves. Travers' save v Serbia is also forgotten. It's when they make mistakes that you can really judge them.
This argument - or variants on it - has come up a few times now and I've not seen anything to back up the idea that Bazunu is a great goalkeeper playing with ten incompetents. For example (and happy to be corrected on any of these stats of course), in 28 league games, he's been named on the League One Team of the Week once. He's won the club's PotM award once, and that was in a month where their only goal was at 4-0 down, so effectively half the team had no chance straight off. Rochdals have one Young Player of the Month award winner this season, but it wasn't Bazunu. The thread on him here notes nothing much else other than two poor games, one against Swindon and one against Fleetwood; his error against Swindon in passing straight to an opposition player was replicated against Qatar, so I don't think you can simply say "He'll study it and learn from it and not make the same mistake again"
So I'm happy to say that he's League One standard. And again, that's good for a developing 19-year-old, but there's no point making him out to be better than he is at the moment. And it's not to have a dig at the guy either, but just to bring some balance into this discussion.
Nonsense. He bailed us out when we had three keepers injured. He's not remotely ready to be first choice. Honestly, take off the green and white blinkers and you'll see that. For me, the Qatar game in particular was Kevin Kilbane in Iceland stuff.
Having seen little of either I said last week I'd prefer Travers over Bazunu simply because I assumed his presence would be superior. I couldn't have been more wrong. Bazunu has that star quality factor alright.
Is that assurance such a great thing though if it makes you come for balls you're never going to reach or make casual passes straight to the opposition CF? He had a couple of ropey moments against Lux but overall a very promising performance, it simply wasn't backed up against Qatar. If it was a more established keeper we'd be within our rights to call it calamitous.
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