Boaz Myhill is almost - almost - Hull City's greatest ever goalkeeper. While it can be infuriating to make comparisons between different generations of footballers given how much the game has changed, it is surely easier to do it when looking at a rollcall of great custodians.
A good goalkeeper needs to be agile, alert, focussed and courageous. He needs to be dominant of both his own defence and the opposition attack, be able to read the match and command his area. And, of course, he needs to be able to catch cleanly, punch distantly, parry effectively and - especially since the advent of the backpass rule - kick the ball strongly and with both feet.
Myhill's perceived weakness is his command of his box and ability to make his defence aware of where he is and what he intends to do. All keepers make errors, of course, and in doing so can often cost their team far more dearly than any misfiring striker finding Row Z on a constant basis. Myhill has made two errors this season, both regarding his command of the box.
Against Chelsea, he made the wrong decision in informing Michael Turner and Kamil Zayatte that he was coming for a through-ball, and Nicolas Anelka nipped in between to score. Then, against Manchester City, he didn't make himself clear enough to the linguistically-deficient Zayatte, and his subsequent heavy touch presented a tap-in to Stephen Ireland.
Of course, the defenders were at fault too - the onus has to remain on them to make the right decision when the ball is outside of the box. Turner or Zayatte should have put their right instep through the ball rather than risking the intervention of Anelka, while Zayatte could have been more aware of the lack of danger around him and the positioning of his keeper when he decided, inexplicably, to miscontrol a needless ball and giftwrap it for Ireland. But a commanding goalkeeper with good reading of the game and communication skills would have anticipated those situations better.
This is Myhill's sole weakness. His agility, positioning when facing an attacker and actual willingness to chuck himself at flying balls is exceptional - witness his terrific clinching save from Cesc Fàbregas at Arsenal which preserved City's 2-1 lead and made Phil Brown celebrate as if we'd scored one rather than prevented one. On this, he is the equal of the benchmark of Hull City goalkeepers, the immortal Tony Norman, who was between the sticks from 1980 to 1988 and once went five whole years without missing any first team game. Norman had the command and communicative combination which often single-handedly rescued dullard City sides from worse fates, and keeps him idolised at the club.
Myhill is in the history books, of course, installed instantly as City's No.1 when he joined from Aston Villa in 2003 after Peter Taylor interrupted his proposed acquisition by Stockport County, where he had just spent a short spell on loan. Villa were his apprenticeship club but opportunities there looked slim, and a drop of three divisions was quite a risk for someone with obvious high calibre to take. He seemed to be a typical Taylor signing - ie, one for the future - but his future began immediately as he was shoved straight into the side ahead of the experienced but ageing Paul Musselwhite. He has never looked back.
A tip-top keeper was key to City's two promotions under Taylor, even though Myhill's contribution was sometimes minimal due to an awesome defensive presence ahead of him in Damien Delaney and Leon Cort. In the Championship, however, he began to exert his authority, and all that potential which Taylor bought into began to show itself.
Which brings us to this weekend's opponents. early in 2006, City travelled to Stoke and proceeded to walk off with, three points, three goals and some isolated moments of hilarity which will be revisited by the Tiger Nation as they gee themselves up for a Premier League visit to the Potteries on Saturday. Leading thanks to an early own goal, City then conceded a penalty which a petrified Paul Gallagher put to Myhill's right, and he duly lurched in the correct direction and batted it away. City then got a second before, crikey, another penalty goes Stoke's way. Gallagher gives way to Luke Chadwick, who manages to do even worse than his team-mate by plopping the ball straight down the middle. Myhill, unlike goalkeepers who dive out of the way of such penalties, somehow read Chadwick's intentions and pouched the ball as if it had been thrown to him by a ball boy. City went on to win 3-0.
Saving two penalties in one match may be freakish, and certainly not an indication of a fully-rounded goalkeeper, but it showed Myhill for one of his major strengths - a real ability to read, estimate and plan the path an attacker's mind is taking. He couldn't anticipate Joey Gudjonsson's successful attempt to lob him from halfway at Leicester a few weeks later, mind, but freakish stuff happens to outfield players too, and it didn't prevent Myhill walking away with all the Player of the Year gongs.
In the last two seasons, Myhill's value has been incalculable. The cries of "Myhill for England" were not wholly ambitious from the supporters, given the terrible form of Paul Robinson and declining years of David James. If a keeper from Peterborough can be noticed by Fabio Capello, then so can one in Hull. As City staved off the drop in 2007, Myhill was crucial and occasionally spectacular, despite miskicking one straight to Stern John for Sunderland's clincher at the Stadium of Light.
In the promotion season, Myhill briefly found himself - to everyone's shock and surprise - out of favour. Matt Duke, his faithful ex-Conference deputy signed by Taylor in League One, was given his usual glove-warmer in the Carling Cup - a 3-0 win at Crewe - and then maintained his place for a handful of Championship matches, having previously only served City at that level when Myhill had been suspended following a dodgy red card at QPR.
Duke is a good goalkeeper and very popular with the fans for his smiling, accepting presence as the understudy, the warm-up helper, to the main custodian. The likes of Eddie Blackburn, John Davies and Gavin Kelly all remember that feeling while working with Norman, though unlike them, Duke does at least get a place on the bench every week. Myhill's contract renewal was ongoing at the time, and it was notable that he was back in the side as soon as it was resolved.
Clever mind games by Brown? Probably. He proved with David Livermore last season that political situations with contracts have to be noticed and remedied. Myhill returned, buoyed by the new deal but chastened by his apparent dispensibility, and played blinder after blinder as City reached the play-offs. His save at Watford in the first leg of the semi-final, a ludicrous angled leap and fisted diversion of an unreachable shot, rocketed him higher into City folklore. At Wembley, he was kept busy without having to make outstanding saves (largely thanks to the City back four), but his improveable command of the box held up, thank goodness, as he punched away or caught the high balls aimed for Dele Adebola. No wonder Wayne Brown jumped on his back as he clutched the final, desperate Bristol City ball to fly in prior to the final whistle and utopia.
And here we are now, a few extra catches and shouts away from giving Norman one final run for his money as City's finest ever goalkeeper. The England chants stopped, of course, once he elected to represent Wales last season, yet one wonders if Mr Capello would have given him his go by now given the way that Joe Hart, Robert Green and even the overrated Scott Carson have all found their way into squads and teams. No matter. Myhill is (sometimes) Wales' No.1, but way more importantly, he is Hull City's No.1 and for as long as he remains so, the club will feel just that little bit safer and stronger.
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