New Delhi: Goalkeeping heroes are special. They could spend a whole game making brilliant saves but are often remembered for their mistakes.
Unai Simon made one at Euro 2020. He failed to trap a Pedri backpass from the halfway line and it trickled past his foot and into the net to gift Croatia a 1-0 lead in the round of 16. Spain fought back to win 5-3 but the fans remember. Simon does too.
“It has tortured me a little. Sincerely, I’ve seen it six or seven times and I can’t find an explanation, I just controlled it badly,” Simon told a news conference in 2021.
“People asked if the sun was in my eyes but it wasn’t, I had lots of space to control the ball, I wanted to play out from the back but my feet stopped dead. I don’t know how many times I’ve tried to control the ball in my life and the ball had never gone in before. It’s an accident but something that can be redeemed very easily.”
Since then, he has been on the redemption path. Spain won Euro 2024. Now, they have the World Cup in their sights and Simon is doing his part.
This year, we have already seen a few special performances in goal. Vozinha of Cape Verde made an instant mark, South Africa’s Ronwen Williams wasn’t too bad either, Argentina’s Emiliano Martinez is a clutch performer, Jordan Pickford kept England alive and Switzerland’s Gregor Kobel combined shot-stopping with calm distribution. But even among this elite group, Simon stands out.
To win matches one needs to score goals, that much is true. But to win trophies, one needs to defend as well and that begins with the goalkeeper.
Teams have averaged around 12 shots per game at this World Cup and the average expected goals (xG) per game has been about 1.5. But through all the chaos of the group stage and two knockout rounds, Spain are the only team to not concede. The defence has been solid and they keep the ball well but it certainly helps to have Simon in goal.
The 29-year-old, who plays for La Liga club Athletic Bilbao, hasn’t conceded a goal in his last 609 minutes of action at the FIFA World Cup, the longest in the tournament’s history.
Simón surpassed the previous record of 517 consecutive scoreless minutes during a 3-0 shutout of Austria to open the knockout round and has since extended it. Famed Italy goalkeeper Walter Zenga set the standard in 1990 with five consecutive clean sheets in his home World Cup.
Interestingly, while the rest of the world is focusing on Lionel Messi, Kylian Mbappe and Erling Haaland and their incredible Golden Boot race, Simon has gone about breaking a few records himself.
A fateful beginning
Fate can be cruel because sometimes, no matter what you do, things don’t fall into place. But sometimes, they do and that is how things turned out for Simon. In August 2018, the then 21-year-old had been training at Athletic for a decade and with the first team for around three years but a breakthrough was not exactly coming his way.
In search of game time, he decided to move to Elche in the second division. Then, Athletic’s first-choice keeper Kepa Arrizabalaga joined Chelsea for a record $91.2m during the 2019-20. Suddenly Athletic wanted Simon back and he made the opportunity count.
“Sometimes you need some luck; that was mine,” Simón told The Guardian in 2025. “What I thought might happen in five, six, seven years happened in 19 days.”
In 2020, he became Spain’s No.1 and has won 63 caps for his country since then, keeping Arsenal’s David Raya and Barcelona’s Joan Garcia out of the starting 11.
Sweeper keeper
Simon is a superb shot blocker. He uses his tall, muscular 6’3” frame to cover large areas of the goal. But he is also comfortable with the ball at his feet. When Spain attack, Simón pushes forward, allowing the centre-backs to split wide.
This makes the already strong Spain midfield even stronger. This compresses play and allows his technically-gifted teammates to control the play. But Belgium will be aware of this.
The Red Devils have averaged 20.06 shots per 90 minutes in this World Cup, meaning Simon should be busy. That makes things interesting but in an interview with AS on Wednesday, he revealed the mindset that allows him to succeed.
“I think every game has to be approached differently, they are all finals and the game against Belgium is going to be a final.”
When asked about winning it all, he added: “We are going to give it our all, that’s clear and at any point, if we fall by the wayside… let it be because the team in front of us proved that they were better than us and not because we gave them reasons to beat us. And that’s it… we have three finals left… let’s start with Belgium. It’s the only match that we need to think about.”
