The 6 Things you Must do Before Buying a Goalkeeper

1) Research the potential new goalkeeper, his competitor, his manager, and the team.

Always read the news about the guy you want to buy, and understand why he is the first or the backup goalie. Is he really as good as you think he is, does he really doesn't have any competition? I want to give the example of Eibar in the Spanish Smart bank Liga. Yoel was the number 1 at the beginning of the season, and without reading anything else and checking his scores, this could look like a good buy. Eibar is a decent team in the league. But if you would have read a bit more you would have found out that there are 3 goalkeepers under contract, Yoel, Cantero, and Zidane.

All three have experience and played for more than a season on the second level in Spain, meaning this can be tricky. It could be perfectly true that Yoel played all matches this season, but it already changed two weeks ago when Zidane took over. You could do great deals here if you have the one playing and you bought him very cheap, but if you bought Yoel for over 1000 euros, that sucks.

If you want to buy a keeper for your Sorare club, also try to understand the manager. Check his history of teams he managed and how he dealt with the goalkeepers. It doesn't always mean anything, but it could give you an idea + check if by accident the manager didn't manage another team with one of the current goalkeepers.

Not that easy, but understand the club where you are buying a player from.

I give you the example of Cercle Brugge in Belgium this season. They are owned by Monaco. When Didillon moved to Monaco as a backup from Nubel, a lot of deals were made around Warleson, as a lot of people thought Warleson would become number 1. Not that weird if you know he played last season a few matches when Didillon was injured. But it was also sure another goalkeeper would arrive, nobody knew if that would be as a number 1 or not. Majecki moved on loan to Cercle, and if you did the research and read what Majecki said in earlier interviews: "I really want to go a team where I am number 1 if I move on loan", it was time to sell Warleson as soon as possible.

2) Read the history on transfermarkt.com

I hope everybody does this as it is a basic thing to do. How experienced is a goalie in the squad? How many seasons he played as the starting goalie, and how many as the backup? On which level he played as starting goalie? How much money was paid for him? It often means you can do some great deals only by checking this. To give you the example of Yvon Mvogo, current number 1 in Lorient. If you look at his past, where he played for many seasons in Young boys Bern. RB Leipzig paid a decent amount of money for him, but he couldn't confirm his level for the German club and became the backup. Moving on loan to PSV looked like the solution for him, which it was in his first season. But in the second season on loan, he lost his spot to Drommel. At that moment it was time to pick him up. As it would be weird if he would stay another season again not being number 1 in PSV or RB Leipzig (Mvogo did play the last months as number 1 last season winning the 1st gk spot again). Of course, this doesn't always mean it ends up like this, but see the signs, think, read, and chat about the one you would want to buy. Here is the chart of Mvogo's rare price fluctuation of the last year.

3) Check the contract status

Another small thing but extremely important for goalkeepers. When does the contract end? Is there any news to find out if they are negotiating a new one? When the contract ends within 12 months be cautious, especially for starting goalkeepers, for backup goalkeepers this can be a very interesting thing.

Let me give you the example of Sergio Asenjo, who is currently playing for Valladolid in the Spanish La Liga. He was out of contract last summer and after spending a big amount of years in Villarreal, it looked like he wanted to move by the end of his contract. If you read this info about someone having an expiring contract, time to start digging into it. He was linked to different teams but Valladolid did look like the most expected one (he already played for the club). At that moment it was tricky, cause Valladolid was battling for promotion and Sorare didn't have the Spanish 2nd league covered yet. At the moment he is not playing (after his injury he couldn't win over his spot against Masip, let's see if that changes over the next weeks or after the WC), the reason I didn't risk buying at that time was the fact that Valladolid was not sure of promotion.

4) The age dilemma

This also seems obvious, but do bear it in mind very well. When people ask me who I can recommend, I always mention the age part. A goalkeeper over 33 years old, is always a bit of a gamble. Many might disagree, but hear me out. My question would be, what will happen if he loses his starting spot? If the answer is: that will not happen, he will play another couple of seasons somewhere else, he will never retire,… Ok, but do you really know the answer to my question? If not, then it's a risk. Of course, the gk can still play another 5 years in a Sorare-covered league, but there are also other possibilities, like retiring.

5) The price vs the market

I don't want to compare too much to the stock market, but in the stock market every stock can be interesting, it just depends on what price you have to pay to get them. Well IMO for goalkeepers goes the same story. Although I do want to make a difference here between limiteds and rares.

In limited it's not that dramatic if you make a mistake and overpay a little bit the goalkeeper, with rares this can be something else. But some goalkeepers can be simply cheap, starting gk or backup depending on a lot of things. Injuries from the gk or his competitor, change of manager, bad performance from the gk or his competitor,….

If we talk about a goalkeeper who is for a full season the number 1 goalkeeper it's easy to compare his price chart. Most probably it will depend on his scores if the price goes down or up (i prefer here mainly to rares as the limited market keeps on changing). When somebody just became number 1 or lost his spot, his price will have increased or decreased a lot, nothing new here I guess. But I do compare goalkeepers price-related. Teams who are likely to end close to each other and the goalkeepers look like the number 1 this season. Check their scores and compare their prices.

6) And the most important of all: think further ahead.

Wtf you mean by that?

My first question while I scout for a new Sorare goalkeeper is: "What's the next team he will play at?" Unfortunately, I can't answer that question most of the time, but do think about it. If you buy a goalkeeper with for example Uruguayan nationality, there might be a possibility he might want to go back to Uruguay in the short-term future, well don't buy him then, as the league is not covered by Sorare for now. If a backup goalie from the german Bundesliga is out of contract this season, there might be a possibility he wants to play again and goes to the 2nd Bundesliga, interesting.

I own a lot of goalkeepers, rares and limited. The reality is that for rares I do a lot of scouting and research, and of course I also make mistakes. But with rares, I didn't make that many faults. With a Sorare limited goalkeeper, I tend to take more risks, not always following my own ideas I explain in this article. And with the prices of limiteds decreasing, I certainly overpaid on goalkeepers in limited.

Good luck with it and I'm always open for a chat about goalkeepers in Sorare.