Manchester United's most consistent player of the season, David De Gea, unfortunately lost the Spain squad for this international match day. The Matadors will play warm-up matches against Albania and Iceland, with De Gea's name not in the 23-man roster, coach Luis Enrique bringing in three goalkeepers and De Gea's place being replaced by Premier League rivals Brentford's David Raya.
Raya is a first-time national team member, having kept five clean sheets in 15 Premier League games this season and was spotted by Arsenal last summer, where he is characterized by his ability to pass the ball and make cameo appearances as a scavenger. Enrique said it was this feature that led him to choose Raya over De Gea. The other two goalskeepers of the Spanish squad will be Bilbao's Unai Simon and Brighton's Robert Sanchez.
"We're looking at different goalkeepers," Henrique explains, "Raya is a very good player and he's doing well. We want to observe him in training and in matches, he has the characteristics of playing for Spain."
Compared to Raya, De Gea excels at goal-line rescues, and this season he has not had a high pass success rate at the back. On the one hand, this is not the advantage of a Manchester United goalkeeper, and on the other hand, the passes given to him by teammates are often challenging. Manchester United captain Maguire, for example, often plays with fire at the back and sends difficult return passes to De Gea.
In the 1-0 defeat to Atletico in the Champions League, there was such a shot. The £80 million iron guard Maguire glued the ball at the back, took the ball around the corner, found that he could not handle it, so he passed the ball to De Gea under the pressure of the opponent. The latter hurriedly broke the line and passed the ball to the feet of his opponent in front of the penalty area, but de Gea then saved Atletico's long-range shot. But he was still very angry and yelled at Maguire.
The same situation occurred in the Premier League and Aston Villa battle, Maguire sent a bouncing cross straight to the goal, originally waiting for a return pass at the bottom line, De Gea forced his foot to reach the ball, was robbed by the opponent, fortunately he also saved the opponent's single knife. After finishing the save, De Gea angrily scolded Maguire with the ball: "I'm standing here, where are you passing me?"
Some fans have criticized De Gea's passing footwork, but his skills are actually not bad, in the Van Gaal era, an important part of United's "big circle" tactics is De Gea's long pass directly docking with Fellaini in front of him. But now United's passing ability in the midfield, as well as the lack of fulcrum in the front, make De Gea's footwork increasingly unfamiliar.
In addition to this, De Gea has not been developing well in Spain, making only 45 appearances, the last time being in October 2020. At last year's European Championships, De Gea never played as a substitute and could only sit on the cold bench in the World Cup, so it would not be surprising if he missed the World Cup at the end of the year.
That's a big blow for De Gea, but it could be a good thing for Manchester United. In 2018, De Gea served as Spain's World Cup No. 1 goalkeeper, only to be beaten off by Cristiano Ronaldo's hat-trick. In contrast, he never played in the European Cup, but inspired the Red Devils to find his form.
Manchester United's Champions League exit, coupled with the defeat of Spain, suffered a double blow this week, but he has boasted that he will use the next off-season efforts.
"It took me a few days to digest my strong disappointment at being eliminated from the Champions League. We didn't do well enough in the two-legged race and it was our responsibility. We must learn lessons, improve ourselves, learn hard, make progress and challenge again. This is all we can do at this difficult time. I've said many times that we're far from our goals, but as players we'll do our best to play the rest of the Premier League."