7 November 2012. Glasgow. In front of almost 60,000 souls who roar like there is no tomorrow, Barcelona succumb 2-1 to Celtic Scotland in the second leg of the group stage of the Champions League. He did it in one of those games without logic in this football thing. The Barça colossus, then with Tito Vilanova on the bench, had 89% possession and 23 scoring chances during the duel. Yet I ran into another giant again and again, this time 2.01 tall: the British goalkeeper Fraser Forster, who led his team to victory.
The goalkeeper, who was 24 years old at the time, despaired a thousand times over Messi, Alexis, Pedro, David Villa, Iniesta and company. Bara was able to thrash, but Forster’s prodigious interventions prevented it. The goalkeeper even gave Tony Watt the assist for Celtic’s 2-0, in the 83rd minute. Only Messi, in the extension, managed to beat him. Although he had to do it at an empty door, when he rejected a new stoppage from Forster to Villa.
I am not going to lie; There have been some excruciatingly hard days on the road, but thankfully I have made it through
Fraser Forster (portero del Southampton)
That night, the goalkeeper presented his credentials to the elite of worldfootball. He earned the nickname of ‘The Great Wall’ (‘The Great Wall’, in Spanish) and, incidentally, the respect of Leo himself. “His performance was the best I have ever seen from a porter. That night Forster was not human“, said the Argentine star in 2015. Not in vain, and as Messi himself acknowledged, Barcelona was interested in his signing to replace Vctor Valds. But in the end he decided on Ter Stegen.
It also started to sound for Real Madrid, Chelsea, Atltico or Manchester United. The siren songs came, but Forster remained at Celtic, where he had been three seasons and had become the hero of the fans.. Newcastle’s youth squad, the goalkeeper had arrived in Glasgow in the summer of 2010, after a great season at Norwich City, then in League One (British third category). But despite his limited experience, Neil Lennon trusted him as guardian. Time proved him right.
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But in the summer of 2014, after having gone to the World Cup in Brazil with England and the resignation of the aforementioned Lennon from Celtic, the tall goalkeeper decided to return to England and sign for Southampton. In the city of the Titanic, he quickly became a key player for Ronald Koeman and an idol for St. Mary’s. And when he was better, and he was starting to start with England, he broke the cruciate ligament in his left knee and had to stop for almost a year. As he returned, Koeman entrusted him with the ownership again and, after that, so did Claude Puel.
Although on December 26, 2017, Boxing Day, everything changed. The Saints were beaten 5-2 by Tottenham and Mauricio Pellegrino, then Southampton manager, stopped trusting him. The coach relegated him to the substitution, from which he did not leave with Mark Hughes, the Argentine’s successor. To the next course Forster he disappeared even from the summons and often, also from Staplewood, the training ground of the ‘Soton’. Stopping counting so suddenly was very difficult for the goalkeeper, as he himself admits. “I’m not going to lie. They were horribly hard times, very dark. It was a very frustrating situation. Sometimes it was hard for me to see the light at the end of the tunnel,” he said in an interview with ‘Irish Mirror’.
It was very difficult, very frustrating, and sometimes it was difficult to see the light at the end of the tunnel; I ended up trapped in that situation
But, fortunately for Forster, everything changed with the arrival on the bench of Ralph Hasesnhttl. The technician counted on him in the final stage of the 18-19 season and last season he decided to hand him over … to Celtic. There, he met up with Neil Lennon, regained his competitive level and won the Premiership. And this season he returned to Southampton, where he competes with Alex McCarthy for a spot under the sticks. He has been the goalkeeper of the Saints throughout the FA Cup, in which he did not concede a single goal until the semifinals, of which the ‘Soton’ has just been felled by Leicester, which won 1-0 in the clash at Wembley.
And in Premier he is also winning the game in the last dates. Until a few months ago he had only played one championship game in the last three years, but on January 4 he returned to the title in the 1-0 victory of the Saints against Liverpool, in a duel after which he was chosen man. of the party. And of the last seven, he has played five. Numbers that show a reality: that, at 33, and after a thorny crossbar, ‘The Great Wall’ has returned to the place where he should never have left.
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