Football / Soccer / Calcio / Futebol / Fußball

Neuer will be 39 by the end of the contract. It's actually insane how he's been performing at the top level at this age

Not even a year ago they wanted to boot out Neuer. Things change so fast

r/unexpectedfactorial

Great news!

This is for all those skeptical fans hating on Neuer and saying Bayern should not extend with him because he was guaranteed to drop off after such an injury.

Neuer Vertrag für Manuel!

I'm obviously going to be biased but I genuinely think Neuer has more of a claim to being the third best player of the past generation than anyone else. It's never going to be easy to back that up with measurable stats in the way you can with goals and assists but just in terms of what he offers the team, he has been massive and evidently continues to be. He has managed single-handedly win matches in the same way that a striker has done - in Flick's full season, Bayern probably wouldn't have won the league if it wasn't for either Lewandowski scoring a lot or Neuer making big save after big save every game. He's a real big game player as well - I can't actually recall a time where he has been at fault for a loss either for Bayern or Germany (the South Korea thing is maybe the best argument you could make but even then it's not like he was up at the other end of the pitch just for funsies).

I can understand why some Bayern fans would dislike this, but honestly it makes sense if they don't have a clear replacement lined up, especially in today's heavily inflated market. He still seems to be capable of doing the job, and we know from the likes of Buffon and van der Sar that top goalkeepers can still perform at 39. The main thing now is to spend the next two years planning for the post-Neuer world.

Neuer actually looks better post injury than he did pre-injury with all the small issues he had. He’s looked brilliant so far.