If one game sums up Rob Elliots career, its the MOTM performance he gave at St. Marys last season, when he repelled effort after effort. The likes of Adam Lallana and Jay Rodriguez were thwarted on multiple occasions, and the showing was reminiscent of a young Shay Given in his pomp. However, a goalkeepers job is to stop the ball flying past him, and the difference between the two Irishmen is that Southampton still plundered four past Elliot. The statistics do not stand Elliot in good stead: he has played 12 times for the club, and one of them was the demoralising 6-0 home defeat to a Suarez-less Liverpool side in 2013. And with the Republic of Ireland hardly spoilt for choice in the goalkeeping department following Given's retirement, it speaks volumes that the former Bishop's Stortford goalie has just the one cap to his name. Elliot is not, nor has he ever been, a Premier League standard goalkeeper. Indeed, when he was poached from Charlton Athletic for £100,000 in 2011, the London outfit were languishing in the third tier of English football. A cheap option at the time from Ashley, but if Tim Krul is to exit this summer, then a season with Elliot between the sticks isnt even worth contemplating.
Recent Journalism & New Media graduate. Insatiable thirst for all things football, and hopes to break into the field of sports journalism in the near future.
Have made a significantly insignificant playing career out of receiving several slaps around the head for not passing the ball.
