Stepping in to replace Emiliano Martinez is an unenviable task, but that’s what Aston Villa goalkeeper Robin Olsen has had to take on over the past few years.
The 35-year-old arrived at Villa, initially on loan, in January 2022, and has gone on to make just 21 appearances since, having largely played a back-up role for Martinez.
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With his experience, the Swedish stalwart was seen an important addition to the squad to provide depth, but it hasn’t necessarily always been a positive match given his struggles when coming into the side.
In those 21 outings for Villa, Olsen has conceded 42 goals, while keeping just four clean sheets.
We’ve had our defensive struggles regardless of personnel over the past couple of seasons, and so that shouldn’t necessarily come as much of a surprise, but that is a lot of goals, which in turn will add substance to the criticism that goes his way as he has been regarded by many as an unsafe pair of hands.
As noted above though, the role of coming in to replace Martinez is a daunting one given what he gives us both in terms of his quality and personality, and so it’s an almost impossible task to fill that void as effectively, in comparison to what we’re used to between the posts.
Further, as we saw just weeks ago away at Crystal Palace, being thrown on at half-time with Martinez unable to continue only makes it a tougher assignment for the Swedish international, and so context is often needed when discussing his performances.
However, Olsen answered that call from Emery again this past weekend, and while it wasn’t entirely convincing throughout the 90 minutes, the Swedish shot-stopper played his part in helping us keep a critical clean sheet at Brentford, which in turn gave us the solid platform on which we could go on and win the game.
There’s certainly no doubting the respect and popularity of Olsen within the Villa dressing room either after what we saw following the full-time whistle as he made his way over to celebrate with the travelling supporters, and the Villa goalkeeper was delighted to make an important contribution.
“I’m so happy,” Olsen told VillaTV. “I’m so proud of the boys and the team, we knew that it’s a really tough away game. “We knew that we had to play at our best, so we did everything we spoke about before the game. I’m just so pleased and proud of the team.
“It’s never easy to have a one-nil lead, I knew they would push us a little bit more. We were struggling a little bit but we defended our box brilliantly. We deserved this clean sheet and those three points. It means a lot to me personally and for the team as well. It means a lot.
“I don’t know what to say, I’m not used to that [his post-game ovation from the fans]. Of course, it’s always nice to celebrate with the fans who have travelled down here and supported us for 90 minutes. It’s just nice to celebrate with them.”
Emery was also keen to praise Olsen after the game, reiterating how respected he is amongst his Villa teammates, while he was pleased with the impact that he made having been called on to start this past weekend.
Villa will surely have had opportunities to move in a different direction when it comes to our goalkeeper depth as we bring the likes of Joe Gauci through, but Emery has stuck with Olsen, as clearly he values him highly too.
“Yes, he did a fantastic job and he is always ready to play, to help,” Emery said of Olsen in his post-game press conference on Saturday. “He’s so so appreciated as a person in the dressing room, and the players as well, they are happy for him as well, because to be substitute for Emi Martinez, the best goalkeeper in the world, is not easy and he is always doing fantastic as a person, as a professional.
‘It was really fantastic how he played today and how he helped us today.”
The hope is that Martinez returns to face Club Brugge this week, and while there are question marks over Olsen in the long-term given his current contract expires this summer and we have younger players being developed to ultimately step up and fill that role, he’ll no doubt continue to be ready to help his teammates when needed.