Arsenal: Manuel Neuer parallels not off course for Bernd Leno

Arsenal dipped into the German keeper stock with Bernd Leno, who was once the next Manuel Neuer, but why can’t he still be just that?

Arsenal‘s keeper situation has been a veritable mess since Wojciech Szczesny left. At least with Szczesny, we knew who the present and the future was, even if he was still growing into that “present” role.

Petr Cech was supposed to fix it, but after a year, he became more of a problem than anything else, and with only David Ospina in behind him, there wasn’t much wiggle room. It was one or the other, til death do us part.

Or until we landed Bernd Leno. The German keeper was holding his own at Bayer Leverkusen, steadily qualifying for European competition, but after being tagged as the next Manuel Neuer from a young age, he was finding it hard to progress to the next level that Neuer was at.

That doesn’t mean we should simply forget the comparison now, just because for two, three years Leno has struggled.

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Neuer is a special case, truly a fantastic keeper, but he didn’t really hit the superstar spectrum until he made the unpopular move from Schalke to Bayern Munich at the age of 25. Even still, he really didn’t win the fanbase over until he was 26 and helped Bayern Munich past Real Madrid in the Champions League of 2012.

Bernd Leno is 26 years old and has just upgraded from his positive beginnings at Bayer Leverkusen to a big time, super club here at Arsenal. And while it took an injury to get him into the driver’s seat, he hasn’t shown any signs of letting it up thus far, as he was fantastic to maintain the clean sheet against Watford, and was unlucky not to double up on that with another against Fulham.

Leno has the makings of a star keeper who just needed a fresh perspective. Life at the Emirates will give him a better chance at superstardom, much like Neuer found at the Allianz. He is a fantastic shot-stopper and controls the ball very similarly to what is seen from, well, Manuel Neuer.

And, unsurprisingly, he has been called up to the Germany national team for this international break. That was all it took, a little twist of good fate and he’s with the big boys.

If it’s good enough for the German national team, it should be good enough for us too.