RAFA: PEPE'S ONE OF THE BEST
Rafael Benitez will send his side out into Champions League action tonight boasting he has one of the world's best goalkeepers between the posts.
Pepe Reina has made an impressive start to the new campaign, conceding goals only from the penalty spot against Aston Villa and Chelsea.
He's the only goalkeeper in the top flight not to have let a goal in from open play, and was the Reds' hero at the weekend when he kept out Kanu's penalty at Portsmouth to save a point for his side.
"If you watch Reina in training every day, you'll see that he is a fantastic worker, he has a very good mentality and a lot of confidence in himself,” says Benitez.
"For us, he is very important. He is more mature, he's learning every day and his team-mates know that he is really, really important and is one of the best two or three goalkeepers in the world.
"People say Pepe has problems in certain areas of his game, but I think he's fantastic. He has adapted well to the English style, he knows when to catch and when to punch. Petr Cech and Buffon are some of other best goalkeepers in the world, and maybe there are two or three as good as Reina but not many.
"It's difficult to say how many points Pepe is worth a season. But the keeper is always important in a team. If you analyse our team, in defence we are good but with Pepe there we are much better.
"He can make one or two mistakes but that's normal as he is the goalkeeper, and the managers and the other players do the same at times.
"But Pepe can save in a season hundreds of opportunities. It's not just about making saves. The best goalkeeper in the world isn't the one who makes the most saves. It's about not allowing the strikers to score, by reading the game and giving the defenders a lot of confidence. His team-mates trust him. They know that he is top class and they have confidence in him." |
發表於 2007-9-18 09:43 PM
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