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Manchester United finds themselves in a spot of bother over their goalkeeper, with Altay Bayindir's mistake in their season-opener against Arsenal at Old Trafford proving costly for the team who are desperately eyeing a revival this season. The Turkish custodian’s mishandling of a first-half corner allowed Riccardo Calafiori to score the only goal of the game, resulting in United starting the 2025-26 season with a home defeat.
Ahead of their next league outing, at Fulham on Sunday, United manager Ruben Amorim will have to make a decision on continuing with Bayindir or bringing someone else between the sticks. And with Andre Onana sidelined due to injury, with his performance also under scrutiny, there’s veteran goalkeeper Tom Heaton the Red Devils can fall back on.
Ex-United keeper urges Amorim to pick Heaton over Bayindir
According to ex-United and West Brom goalkeeper Ben Foster, Heaton would be the right choice for the Portuguese coach for their first away game of the season, even if the 39-year-old hasn’t played in the Premier League since 2020.
“This is a massive problem for the next game. It asks all sorts of questions and there’s going to be so much talk surrounding it coming into that next game. Do you start with Bayindir, whose confidence will be low now after the first game?
“With Onana, people will be going, ‘Well, he’s not much better.’ There’s a lot of pressure. Tom Heaton, I would trust him to give me a six-and-a-half out of 10 performance,” Foster said on the Fozcast podcast.
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Foster, who was primarily a reserve keeper for United during his years at Old Trafford 2005 to 2010, added that the 20-time top-flight champions needed to make at least one more purchase before the 1 September deadline for the summer transfer window – that of a goalkeeper, preferably Aston Villa’s Emiliano Martinez or Paris Saint-Germain’s Gianluigi Donnarumma.
United have already spent over £200 million on the forward trio of Benjamin Sesko, Bryan Mbeumo and Matheus Cunha, and have acquired just one defender – Paraguay’s Diego Leon for £7 million.
“It just forces Man United’s hand to go and sign a proper goalkeeper. I think if you can get a Martinez or a Donnarumma, you’ve just got to do it. If you sign that player, it’s going to be the difference between mid-table misery or really pushing for that top six,” Foster added.
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