Stockdale Would Consider Loan Move Next Season

[Jack Fulham]

Only thing Stockdale has over Schwarzer at the moment is his kicking which is superb. Mark's still brilliant and has got another season in him. Stockdale will hopefully become our #1 though.

[HatterDon]

Schwarzer is not going to get better. Stockdale is.

Stockdale might get better but it'll need to be some improvement to be as good as Schwarzer who for me is not yet in decline.

If he stays he'll get games next season. Pre season, cups, if Schwarzer gets injured or rested after long international trips. The takeover can be gradual.

Young keepers can easily lose confidence and/or simply not mature as expected - Kirkland, Carson for instance.

Since our priority every year is to stay up I'd go with our best keeper regardless of age.

Tony, you don't think that Schwarzer was better last season than this? You think he'll be better next season than this?

I think Roy got him at the right time, and we had some fantastic football from him. I haven't seen as much of that brilliance from him this season. It might well be that Stockdale at #1 will make a few more mistakes over the course of next season than Schwarzer would, but I think it's reasonable to expect that the slight downturn in Schwarzer's overall game out continue. Only Van der Sar and Friedel don't seem to be affected by aging.

[TonyGilroy]

Only my opinion but I think Schwarzer is still as good as ever and is at least as good as any other Prem keeper and better than most.

If he matches Van Der Sar he can maintain this level for another 2 seasons. I'd stick with him regardless of Stockdale's potential.

[MJG]

Schwarzer has not reached the heights he achieved in the last two seasons (which were very high).
It is downhill for him now as I think thats as good as it gets. That does not make him a bad GK but in my experience once a GK starts to make mistakes they get worse very quickly.

I'm a bit torn on this one, I want Stockdale to progress and he can only really do that with games. Hughes has to make the decision of loan Stockdale out with a recall option or make him no1.He's not 21 he's mid 20's now and should be a first team GK somewhere.For him to sit on the bench for the whole of next season would be a waste and we would still be having this discussion next year if he does that.

If there is a good experienced backup keeper we could get, an offer for MS and make Stockdale No1...that would be my option.

[richie17]

The nice thing about Schwarzer is that he's in the Keller school rather than the Niemi one, or Shilton v Southall if you will.  He doesn't rely on agility because his positioning and instincts are so good.  While we're still watching the man in possession Schwarzer's getting in the right place to make the save, so he makes things look easy that lesser goalkeepers would have to dive for.

I don't think he's fallen away too much, and if he has he's still one of the top five keepers in the division. 

So it's another nice problem for Hughes to have.