Player Focus: Julio César - A Better Option for Napoli than Arsenal
Only 3 summers ago Julio César was lifting the Champions League trophy aloft as José Mourinho's Inter Milan side completed an historic treble. He was named Serie A goalkeeper of the year and UEFA's best goalkeeper following his side's success. At the time, few could have argued with the assertion that then 30-year old César was amongst the best goalkeepers on the planet. Fewer still could have predicted a meteoric demise that would see the Brazilian relegated from the Premier League with QPR this season. Unlikely as it might have seemed in 2010, exactly that has happened.
Now, with the R's demoted to England's second tier, there is a need for the club to remove César from their wage bill and little reason for him to stick about and contest the number 1 spot with Rob Green any longer. Clubs the world over were made fully aware of his continued pedigree despite his advancing years after his Golden Glove winning performances at the 2013 Confederations Cup, and while Napoli and Arsenal's reported interest comes as no great shock, arguably the fact that they are the only teams that have been heavily linked with the Brazilian is rather surprising.
César showed this summer that he is still worthy of a starting berth for the national side, though Luis Felipe Scolari would be forced to reconsider if the stopper was not playing at the top level. Now, with a move to a Champions League-qualified team on the cards, it seems any potential move across London may have fallen through, and Naples may be his destination in the coming weeks. Morgan De Sanctis looks like he may be on his way to Rome, so there will be a slot that needs filling at the Stadio San Paolo, while he would probably be little other than competition for the Arsene Wenger-favoured Wojciech Szczesny at the Emirates.
César's save success rate of 72.9% ranks him fourth of first choice Premier League 'keepers last season, with his rate similar to that of Szczesny (72.7%) and marginally behind De Sanctis (75.4%). However, playing behind a poorly organised defence for a relegation threatened team will have meant the chances he faced were often more clear-cut than those of either the Arsenal or Napoli stoppers. In fact, QPR allowed their opponents 77 big chances - one-on-ones, free headers, open goals and the like - in league games this season, while, predictably, Arsenal (65) and Napoli (47) conceded significantly fewer such chances. Resultantly, César will have come up against strikers charging through on goal more often and has thus done extremely well to retain such an impressive ratio of saves-to-shots on target faced.
In terms of other options already with the Gunners, Lukasz Fabianski provides the only backup following Vito Mannone's departure to Sunderland. The Pole's 63.6% save success rate leaves a lot to be desired, though his presence in the starting lineup this term did coincide with 5 successive wins, beginning with a 2-0 win over Bayern Munich at the Allianz Arena. Napoli's backup stopper saved just 50% of the shots on target he faced, conceding 8 goals in just 4 Serie A appearances this season. The Partenopei shipped just 28 goals in their 34 matches with De Sanctis in goal. César would certainly offer more in this regard than those options if he were to join either team.
After playing for Europe's dominant side only a few years ago, César had to adjust to the fast-paced game in England with the added challenge of playing for a team that allowed their opponents an almighty 603 shots over the course of the season. He was therefore forced into making 4 saves per game; the 2nd most of all first-choice Premier League goalkeepers (15+ appearances), behind West Ham's Jussi Jääskeläinen (4.4). Unfortunately for the Loftus Road side, that wasn't enough to prevent a bottom-placed finish which concluded one of the most catastrophic periods of heavy spending in the history of English football.
Given the poor quality of the players in front of him, the Brazil number 1 was forced into looking long all too often. In fact, nearly 3 in every 4 of his passes (74.7%) were sent long and high upfield, looking for the head of Bobby Zamora or the like. The resulting pass success rate he managed of just 42.6% was wholly unimpressive, and way down on anything that might be expected of him if he is to win a move away from West London to any top team.
Both Arsenal and Napoli will want a distributor capable of retaining possession and starting attacks, who is also able to do the traditional goalkeeping duties. Szczesny opted to play just 63.2% of his passes long last season, with an overall pass success rate of 66.1%; not overly impressive but markedly up on that of César. What is more, when looking to play the ball further upfield, Szczesny did so with the second-highest success rate of all Premier League goalkeepers last season (48.2%) behind Stoke's Asmir Begovic, while César maintained the third-worst such rate (29.0%). While César might improve what is already a rather water-tight defence at the Emirates (which let in just 37 goals last season), he might not do much to keep up the possession-retaining game that Wenger has continually promoted during his time in London.
At Napoli, De Sanctis played fewer still of his passes long (58.9%) as Walter Mazzarri encouraged his team to play out from the back as often as possible. His pass success of 58.3% is not a vast improvement on César's, and the Brazilian could arguably raise his accuracy in this regard to nearer the rate of the Italian when given the chance to distribute short passes more often than he could when at Loftus Road.
A space is likely to be opened up at Napoli, and it seems César could be a viable option to step into the boots left by De Sanctis. In terms of Arsenal's supposed pursuit of the Brazilian, it is not all that surprising that nothing came to fruition. His wages demands alone will probably have put Mr Gazidis off, and with a rather sturdy defence already, the Gunners won't want to take up a sizeable chunk of their budget bringing in another goalkeeper who may not prevent many more goals whilst also depleting their ball retention. Instead, he seems more suited to a move to Napoli, or at least, with De Sanctis on his way out the door, he will be an adequate replacement.
