"?Manchester City are widely believed to be on the verge of signing Barcelona goalkeeper Claudio Bravo for £17m as part of the ongoing revolution put in place by new manager Pep Guardiola, making the Chilean the third most expensive stopper of all time.
It's a move that will surely end the Etihad career of Joe Hart after 10 years with the club, dropped from the team for the opening Premier League game of the season at the weekend.
Guardiola is known to like his goalkeepers to be involved in open play, an 11th man to pass the ball to and keep possession away from the opposition.
The revered coach certainly had that at Bayern Munich over the last three years with Manuel Neuer, the master sweeper-keeper. The German number one played 2,077 short passes last season compared to just 562 from Hart in England (Daily Mail).
Guardiola isn't buying Neuer, but Bravo is equally adept with the ball at his feet. The Chilean boasted an 84.3% pass completion rate last season, the highest of any goalkeeper in all of Europe's top five leagues. Hart, meanwhile, averaged fewer accurate passes than any Premier League goalkeeper who made 20 or more appearances (WhoScored).
Standing at 6 ft 5 in tall and weighing more than 14 stone, Hart is noticeably taller and more heavily built than Bravo, which is definitely an advantage when it comes to the fast paced physicality of Premier League football.
The former Shrewsbury Town junior is also a dressing room leader in Manchester and has captained both club and country on a number of occasions. But a leader himself, Bravo, at 33 years of age, is even more experienced and is Chilean national team captain, taking over the role in 2007. He has also lifted the Copa America trophy in each of the last two summers.
Hart's greatest attribute is his shot stopping skills, but Bravo certainly has the record to match him and there's more to it than simply playing behind such a dominant team as well. The Barça goalkeeper proved a solid last line of defence in La Liga last season, saving 78.9% of the shots he faced, the second best in the division (WhoScored).
Where Hart badly lets himself down is with avoidable errors, which as a goalkeeper often directly leads to goals. He has been at fault on more occasions than any other City player since 2012/13, making 16 defensive errors - 13 of those resulted in goals (
https://twitter.com/Squawka/status/765538871861837824 — (@Squawka) December 6, 2017
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Joe Hart has made more defensive errors (16) since 2012/13 than any other Man City player; 13 leading to goals. pic.twitter.com/ECKSptNIgz
Nobody is calling Joe Hart a bad goalkeeper, but it seems clear that City would be getting an upgrade with Claudio Bravo between the sticks, a player who just seems an altogether better fit for the direction that Pep Guardiola wants to take the club in moving forward.
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