View: Aston Villa goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez should win save of the month
Aston Villa goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez has been nominated for the first-ever Premier League save of the month award.
Despite a slow start to the season, the former Arsenal stopped has had moments of brilliance in between the sticks for Villa.
One such instance occurred in the loss against Crystal Palace in which he made a phenomenal stop after coming off his line to deny Andre Ayew.
It occurred at a crucial stage of the game as the score was 1-1 and both teams looked like they were headed into the break with score level.
While he did not end up on the winning side, it should not take away from what an incredible safe it was by the Argentine.
Martínez faces competition from Leeds United’s Illan Meslier, Wolves’ Jose Sa, Newcastle’s Nick Pope, Tottenham Hotspur’s Hugo Lloris, Brentford’s David Raya, Leicester City’s Danny Ward and Nottingham Forest’s Dean Henderson for the award.
Most of the other saves are routine ones and do not really highly too many individual skills of the keeper.
Here, Martinez’s footwork, awareness, reflexes and shot-stopping have all been showcased and his reaction time was also close to nothing.
It’s a good thing that the Premier League have started the initiative to reward keepers as well and we believe the 30-year-old deserves to win this first-ever award.
In other Aston Villa news, manager Steven Gerrard is very keen to bring Liverpool defender Joe Gomez to the club.