It’s not a perfect time for a goalkeeper on an expiring contract with a huge salary to start making small mistakes that get bigger. Corriere dello Sport reports that Sporting Director Paratici at Fiotrentina has started looking for a replacement for first goalkeeper David de Gea.
The salary is nowhere near what he brought in as a first-choice goalkeeper for Manchester United, but €3.5 million is a lot, especially if you take credit for losing points. De Gea spent 12 years at Old Trafford from 2011, before joining Fiorentina on a free transfer in 2024.
Read: ‘Shocked’ – Why Manchester United chose Erik ten Hag over Mauricio Pochettino in 2022
When De Gea becomes a Fiorentina affair: Vanoli defends him – but Paratici looks around
Manager Paolo Vanoli (who is likely to be sacked soon) on the Spanish goalkeeper: “David is my captain, it will never be a problem.” But both the salary and the goals conceded cause headaches.
Paolo Vanoli was brought back in the autumn after being fired in the summer due to poor results, results that are even worse now.
Fiorentina, De Gea’s mistake at home at the Stadio Artemio Franchi against Juventus.
The Italian newspaper writes (directly translated): He had done it eight days earlier too – in Reggio Emilia, on a deep pass from Sebastiano Esposito that Laurienté received without hesitation, with number 43 with his gloves ready in the box for 1-0 for Sassuolo. A perhaps less visible weakness, which, together with the far more glaring mistake against Juventus, ends up in the already conspicuous album of this year’s lack of intervention: At the back, De Gea was not flawless against Como either, when he was passed on an unrealistically high right-footed shot from Douvikas to the goal that decided the game. And his unsuccessful return in Genoa gave way to a 1-0 draw for Grifone. Nor was he flawless at the start of the year, either against Frosinone (on Bracaglia’s quick 2-0 goal) nor in his league debut against Roma (where Malen retired). To underline the seriousness, there is a figure related to avoided xG, which is -3.3 for the former United goalkeeper: this means that De Gea has so far conceded just over 3 goals more than expected. (At the other end of the table, to be clear, Palmisani is at Frosinone with +6.1 – i.e. over 6 goals potentially avoided.)
Paratici and the alternatives on the market
There are no real options at the moment (Christensen and Lezzerini offer no certainty), but Fiorentina – and especially sporting director Paratici, who had already looked around in June last year – are thinking about the future of a goalkeeper who weighs 3.5 million euros net per season on the club’s coffers. The impression is that this will be De Gea’s last seven months in Florence: the future is Tommaso Martinelli, the goalkeeper owned by Fiorentina and on loan at Serie B club Avellino – but in the meantime, Viola will explore the international market to find something else. The name Santiago Beltran, born in 2004 in River Plate, is constantly mentioned.
