Two England games, three months apart, and two very different impressions of James Trafford for Burnley supporters.
The first came in July, when the goalkeeper’s heroics in the final of the Under-21 European Championship against Spain – when he saved Abel Ruiz’s penalty and Aimar Oroz’s rebound in second-half stoppage time to preserve a 1-0 win – capped a superb run of six clean sheets out of six for him at the tournament and ultimately helped lift the trophy. The £19million deal that had already been struck for promoted Burnley to sign him from Manchester City was looking like shrewd business.
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The second impression came on Monday, as England Under-21s were beaten 3-2 by their Ukraine counterparts, was distinctly less positive – specifically the second Ukraine goal to make it 2-0 late in the first half, a lofted free kick from the right flank that went over Trafford’s head and dropped into the net.
It was a moment that further fuelled the debate raging among Burnley fans over whether he or last season’s first choice Arijanet Muric should be the club’s No 1.
The initial discussion centred on why Burnley were paying a significant fee for a 20-year-old (Trafford turned 21 this month) when they already had a goalkeeper who had just performed well in the club’s Championship title season, while other areas of the squad needed more attention on their return to the top flight.
It continued into pre-season.
Trafford made a handful of errors, most notably when he was lobbed from the halfway line against Real Betis in his second appearance for the club, while Muric barely put a foot wrong in the warm-up friendlies.
Even so, Trafford got the nod for the opening game of the season against former employers City and has remained an ever-present in the Premier League, with Muric playing only in the two Carabao Cup victories over Nottingham Forest and fourth-tier Salford City.
Club sources, who asked to remain anonymous to protect relationships, insist there was and remains healthy competition for the goalkeeping spot in the starting XI. Part of the culture manager Vincent Kompany wants to create is one where places in the team are decided by performances on the training pitch. Muric is understood to have dealt with the added competition well.
There is some sympathy for Trafford, a young man who had not played higher than League One before this season. To be in goal for a newly-promoted top-flight side, and in a daunting run of opening fixtures, has not been easy: Burnley are third-bottom, having conceded 20 goals in their first eight league games (only last-placed Sheffield United’s record is worse) and did not keep a clean sheet in any of them.
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Yet Trafford has hardly been guilty of a string of blunders when conceding these goals — Kompany has referenced three of them as Goal of the Month contenders. The manager does not feel his young goalkeeper has looked out of place having made the two-division jump from playing for Bolton Wanderers on loan last season and has been impressed by his character, technical ability and game understanding.
Yes, Trafford could have dropped quicker to Elijah Adebayo’s close-range strike in the 2-1 victory over Luton Town early this month; and, yes, he could have closed down Ollie Watkins for Aston Villa’s opener at Turf Moor in August (although the striker’s touch was looser than expected, which gave him an awkward decision). But there haven’t been any howlers.
That said, the statistics suggest Trafford has struggled.
Looking at the table below, which compares the expected number of goals a goalkeeper will concede to the number of goals they have conceded to calculate goals prevented, Trafford is on -0.83. Excluding own goals, he has conceded 19 goals from an xG of 18.17. Only Mark Flekken of Brentford (-3.23) and Manchester United’s Andre Onana (-1.32) have prevented fewer.
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Generally, -1.0 for xGOT (expected goals on target) is about average for a goalkeeper, so it is far from a disaster. As the season progresses and the sample size increases, the number of goalkeepers overperforming theirs is likely to decrease.
Trafford prevented 5.5 goals more than the data would suggest last season for Bolton, but conceded 4.8 more than the data would suggest in 2021-22 when, while still in his teens, he was loaned by City to another third-tier side in Accrington Stanley and then, from the January on, Bolton. These figures suggest the talented shot-stopper is still finding his feet and consistency.
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Last season, Muric overperformed his xGOT by 3.2, playing a big role in Burnley recording the best defensive record in the Championship following his own move the short distance from Manchester City. Similarly to Trafford’s excellent form one division further down the ladder, transferring that to the top flight is a different story.
Kompany does not just want a good shot-stopper. To play his system, goalkeepers need to be good with the ball at their feet, and figures at Burnley who have watched him in training have described Trafford as “ice cool” in possession.
No goalkeeper took more touches or completed more passes than Trafford last season across England’s top four divisions, so there is no doubting his confidence.
Comparing his 2022-23 pass map to Muric’s, we can see how much their distribution is centred on short passes to the centre-backs. The biggest difference is Muric has a much better long-ball success rate: 49 per cent to 29 per cent.
Muric didn’t enjoy the smoothest start to life at Turf Moor either. The 3-3 draw with Blackpool in the August of last season included a number of kicking errors, one of which led to the visitors’ first goal.
There were grumblings in the crowd after that but the now 24-year-old Kosovo international turned opinion his way. By the end of the season, his passing was key to Burnley’s build-up play – especially his long balls, which turned defence into attack instantly — and the number of mistakes had lessened.
This pass away to West Bromwich Albion last September released Nathan Tella in behind…
…and resulted in the attacker winning a penalty after being brought down by ’keeper David Button.
We have yet to see distribution like this from Trafford but playing out from the back in League One, or even the Championship, is very different to doing it in the Premier League. For most of the season, teams did not press Burnley as high up or as intensely as West Brom are in the example above.
“Teams are more aggressive and more willing to open up but that’s the opportunities you want to use as well,” said Kompany. “When you’re a Premier League team, or anywhere in the world, it’s to improve to the level of who you’re playing against.”
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Of the 22 goalkeepers to have played at least four Premier League games this season, Trafford ranks 14th in passing accuracy at 74 per cent.
And there is no fear of using him in the game. He is hitting the most passes of any goalkeeper in the division this season, at a rate of 50.4 per 90 minutes. Only Brighton’s Bart Verbruggen (38.0), who has played four games to his eight, is making more successful passes per 90 than his 37.3.
“You’ve got to be good in every moment in this league. That’s the key message. Our goals, our big chances, have come from these moments,” said Kompany. “For keepers and defenders, the more it gets quiet, the better you’re doing your job. Eventually, you get recognised for it.”
There have been a few nervy moments for Trafford, but none have led to a goal being conceded. And it should be remembered that Burnley’s goal against Chelsea in their most recent match and their first in the win at Luton four days earlier both came from building out from the back.
Burnley’s initial goalkeeping target this summer was Verbruggen, who opted to join Brighton from Anderlecht instead of reuniting with Kompany, his former manager at that Belgian club. He has made high-profile errors already trying to play out from the back against Bournemouth and Liverpool.
Kompany is not concerned about Trafford. For now, there are no signs that a change is imminent.
(Top photo: Michael Regan/Getty Images)