| Scottish Cup fifth round: Celtic v St Johnstone |
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| Venue: Celtic Park Date: Sunday, 10 February Kick-off: 13:30 GMT |
| Coverage: Live commentary on BBC Radio Scotland; live text commentary on BBC Sport website |
Scott Bain has only made 12 appearances for Celtic this season, but he has started his club’s last six games. Has Brendan Rodgers’ anointed him first-choice goalkeeper?
Although rival Craig Gordon has enjoyed a successful stint at Celtic, he has at times seemed at odds with Rodgers’ style of football – an area in which Bain has since thrived whenever offered the opportunity.
So if Bain has been promoted, what makes him a better option between the posts? BBC Scotland assess the numbers to try and find out.
A new type of goalkeeper
The perceived wisdom seems to be that Bain is Rodgers’ preferred stopper because he’s better with the ball at his feet. And as far as the stats are concerned that certainly seems to be the case.
Bain and Gordon have an almost identical average of passes per 90 minutes (22.41 and 21.89 respectively) but while Bain’s accuracy stands at an impressive 96.5%, Gordon’s takes a notable dip to 86.2%. And things only get worse for the senior goalkeeper when we dive even further into both player’s passing stats.
Gordon currently averages 6.92 long passes per match, which is almost three times greater than Bain’s average of 2.34. Yet what is perhaps most telling is that Gordon’s accuracy with said punts up the park stands at just 62%, while Bain tends to find his preferred target 81.2% of the time.
A similar trend comes to the fore when we look at both players’ forward passing. While Gordon, again, attempts far more than Bain per match (12.31 to 9.78 respectively) the accuracy of his passing stands at 78%. Bain, on the other hand, completes 94% of his.
Essentially, Gordon and Bain make a similar number of passes per game but the former tends to focus on longer, less accurate passes while Bain seems more interested in shorter passes that tend to reach their target with far more regularity.
Old-fashioned shot-stopping
When it comes to the more traditional aspects of a goalkeeper’s job there is much less to choose between the Celtic duo.
Although Gordon is perhaps best regarded as a great saver of shots, Bain tends to save more on average per match.
The younger goalkeeper currently saves an average of 95% of shots fired towards him each game, compared to Gordon’s 73%.
On the other hand, Gordon is the better of the two goalkeepers when it comes to dominating in the air. Despite only being four inches taller, he wins 89% of aerial duels in the Celtic box, compared to Bain’s 67%.
‘He understands the game’
Rodgers himself says Bain fulfils his bread-and-butter goalkeeper duties while also possessing a “wonderful view of the game”.
“He understands when it needs speeding up, when it needs controlling. And for my teams throughout my life that’s how I’ve always had it,” the Celtic manager said after Wednesday’s 2-0 win over Hibernian.
“The goalkeepers don’t need to be 6ft 4ins or 6ft 5ins as long as they’ve got good agility, can make saves and then they can participate in the game when we have the ball.
“You see in a game like tonight, Hibs are playing with two front players and they want to press with a number 10 in behind, you then need a goalkeeper who can stay calm and pick out the lines of pass that we would want him to.
“He misplaced one pass – which was the first one and he knows he should have had a touch – but apart from that he was immaculate. He’s very, very good.”
Content provided by the BBC. Original piece can be found here https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/47187256
