Zack Steffen spent the 2019-20′ season on loan from Manchester City, but reportedly is set to stay with the Premier League giants next season.
Steffen will stay with Pep Guardiola’s side for the 2020-21′ campaign, according to ESPN. The U.S. Men’s National Team No. 1 goalkeeper played with Bundesliga side Fortuna Dusseldorf this season, but failed to appear in 2020 due to injuries.
The former Columbus Crew starter made 18 combined appearances for Dusseldorf in the first-half of the season, posting two clean sheets. A patellar tendon issue and MCL injury respectively forced Steffen to watch the second-half of Dusseldorf’s season from the sidelines, despite working his way back to training near the end of play.
Arriving in Manchester in 2019, Steffen immediately was loaned out due to not qualifying for a work permit in England. Dusseldorf was reportedly interested in keeping Steffen for an additional season, but following their relegation to the 2. Bundesliga it seems unlikely the 25-year-old would rejoin.
37-year-old Claudio Bravo is currently Manchester City’s backup goalkeeper behind Brazilian star Ederson. Bravo’s contract will expire though at the end of the current season, leaving an opening for Steffen to come in and learn Guardiola’s system.
Steffen has earned 17 caps for the USMNT, becoming a regular starter under former head coach Gregg Berhalter when fit. Manchester City could also use Steffen in cup competitions next season and also the UEFA Champions League, should the Citizens win their two-year ban appeal against the Arbitration of Sport.
Larry Henry Jr, did I miss the news that Berhalter was fired?
“Steffen has earned 17 caps for the USMNT, becoming a regular starter under FORMER head coach Gregg Berhalter when fit.”
Oh how I wish, sadly I think he is just referring to former head coach with the Crew.
Bravo played 17 matches this season, 1 last season (Achilles Injury), 13 matches the year before. Number of matches will be determined by how far they make it in Cup play.
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This situation is very different from Horvath. Ethan has played 1 match after Mignelot arrived against a 4th division side. Second, Zach has already established him as the first choice keeper and played for Berhalter at Columbus he already has Gregg’s trust. Third, he’ll be playing for Guardiola which is what Gregg’s system is based on.
Important to remember that the number of Cup games appears likely to be limited for Man City next year. They’ll get a decision on the appeal of the CL ban next week. Even if this happens, from what I’m reading it seems likely that EPL teams in European competition will be allowed to skip the League Cup entirely. Basic idea is no English team will contest more than 3 competitions in the season (with the possible exception of a team who drops from the CL to the Europa via 3rd place finish).
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Personally, I’m a little worried about the prospect of playing time for Steffen. While I concur that he’d likely get quite a few more games than Horvath did at Brugge, I’d also say Horvath now has an opportunity to close the gap, assuming he finds an every day job at a decent team. And this is good, for me — neither is the finished product yet.
If we wanna be technical, it’s been the also aged Scott Carson (on loan from Derby County) that’s been Ederson’s back-up since the re-start.
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Real good chance that he will be the #2 as they no longer appear to rate Muric (despite him being Kosovo’s #1). What that means remains to be seen as Ederson plays more than any other EPL keeper, and with the threat of no Champions League for City next year, Steffen’s chances might be limited to Cup games.