Sport needs more rogues like Emiliano Martinez. His cartoon villain act is genius and goalkeepers are meant to be different, writes RIATH AL-SAMARRAI

When the great Brian Glanville wrote Goalkeepers are different Five decades ago, he had no idea how far Emiliano Martinez would push the boundaries of his concept.

It says a lot about the guy in the Aston Villa goal that he is uniquely qualified to be cast as football’s most cartoonish villain and one of the game’s very best goalkeepers. Somehow, “different” doesn’t quite cover its limbs.

Of course there is brilliance in Martinez. The way he performed against Bayern Munich in midweek reminded us that this was less than necessary as we know the depths of his quality. Just as we are well aware that one side of his brain has evolved faster than the half overrun by squirrels.

Harry Kane saw Martinez’s brilliance up close on Wednesday night, as did Serge Gnabry and Michael Olise – big chances met with difficult saves. Jhon Duran was the frontrunner, but Martinez was the unbridgeable layer between a win and a draw or worse. We said the same thing about the last World Cup final and we might say it again when Villa play Manchester United on Sunday.

If there is a better player at his position, then it’s a conversation limited to a few names. Alisson Becker takes it for my money. Thibaut Courtois is also in that mix and Ederson, David Raya, Unai Simon and Gianluigi Donnarumma make convincing cases.

Certainly, they have all proven that they make a difference in terms of results and campaigns. But none of those guys are different like Martinez.

They didn’t end last month with a two-match international ban from FIFA and they didn’t start this week with a promise unlikely to be kept. In these surreal matters, Martinez stands alone; a goalkeeper whose ability to define big matches is matched by the urge he has to bump his crotch against the spoils of victory.

Love moves in mysterious ways, but no move is as mysterious, as strange, as Martinez’s hips when a prize is within reach.

There was his romance with the Golden Glove at the World Cup in 2022. And indeed the equivalent at the Copa America in 2021, before becoming overly familiar with the main trophy when Argentina won it again a few weeks ago.

Thank God, if Aston Villa’s early Champions League form takes them to an unlikely destination, two things would be true at once: Martinez will have played a key role and UEFA will surely need to hire snipers to protect their grand old cup.

But let’s return to the promise he spread via social media on Monday. Martinez says his days as punchers are over. He apologizes. He said the aim of his celebration is to “make many children smile”, adding: “It was never my intention to disrespect anyone, nor did I understand that a gesture that was well received by people was offensive , but I will. don’t try to offend anyone anymore.’

He made similar commitments after the World Cup, when Patrick Vieira became quite angry due to his podium moment. Martinez, he said, had “taken away a little bit of what Argentina had achieved.” It was not an isolated vision.

Martinez was rude and he got hit for it. Justifiably. But that’s his demeanor and humor – often the genius gets the squirrels working and squirrels can’t be reasoned with.

During Argentina’s most recent Copa America title last month, just before his meeting with the trophy, he punched the camera and FIFA didn’t like that either.

Nor did people react with universal approval when he bumped his crotch into Kylian Mbappe’s face ahead of a penalty in the World Cup final and then cradled a doll, masked with a photo of the same player’s face, in the bus parade.

That’s what Martinez does: he’s childish, a 32-year-old man without a filter. A master of goalkeeping and gamesmanship. A serial irritant that guards as many lines as it crosses. He irritates, he provokes. Above all, he is different.

And that is welcome in the most special way. Now perhaps more than ever.

We live in the petri dish age of football, an age of pompous hypocrisy, where perfection goes to horribly sanitized places. We want angels and we’ll knock down those with dirty wings, but the sport needs its villains.

A fetish for trophies may be a push in a stupid direction, but Martinez at least has taste. He is the crazy, crazy and human face of a game that tends towards robots and the lines of VAR.

He is a splash of color when so many other personalities are repressed and dull; the kind of man who needs to be reminded annually that it is inappropriate to rub his crotch on a trophy in front of a camera. But he is a free spirit and that has enormous value.

When they talk to people in and around Aston Villa, they are more keen to emphasize the other qualities, namely the qualities that win games.

They also talk about a man whose dedication to his craft is unsurpassed and the proof is in the output – to witness his rise from the fringes of Arsenal to World Cup winner is to conclude that his signing for £17 million in 2020 was one of the best deals in the world. last decade of the Premier League. He worked extremely hard to make this happen.

After the victory at Bayern, Martinez responded by saying: ‘I love to keep growing and becoming the best. I have no ceiling, I want to keep growing.’

He might have stopped that speech after three words and no one would have questioned his judgment. We can also wonder if his commitment to growth will lead to conformity at the end of a week that tested both aspects of his character.

But let’s hope the squirrels retain some voice within his inner monologues. Goalkeepers are meant to be different.

McCarthy should have stayed quiet

There’s nothing like a good stack-on, and nowhere is a stack-on as good as at Manchester United. It must be difficult for Erik ten Hag to keep track of all the shoes that ended up in his ribs during these apocalyptic days.

But he may have been surprised by the kicking he received from Benni McCarthy, whose two-year tenure as United’s attacking coach ended in the summer.

Some of what McCarthy said was piercingly accurate: passion matters and Ten Hag shows little. We also agreed with the South African’s criticism when he claimed that certain players had not put in the effort in training, but that is reminiscent of McCarthy who was fined £200,000 at West Ham in 2010 for almost was two stone overweight.

He may not have passed the ‘show us your medals’ test on that score, and the same could be said about his wider record as a striker coach at United. In McCarthy’s two seasons, United scored 58 and 57 league goals. For context, in eleven post-Ferguson campaigns, these numbers rank seventh and tied for eighth, so perhaps McCarthy should have stuck to his advice.

Of course, that’s not how a stack-on works. If a manager is down, you go for him. But Ten Hag did not act alone.

Sancho leaves Ten Hag with a red face

Cole Palmer casts a brilliant and wide shadow on what has been an exceptional start to the season for Chelsea. In the shadows, but not lost, stands Jadon Sancho.

This time last year he was left out of Manchester United’s first-team lunches and today he has provided three assists in three games at Chelsea and opened holes at both West Ham and Brighton. He has the best dribbling stats in the league and his inclusion in Sunday’s match against Nottingham Forest looks like the winger we remember.

The one before his thoughts exploded in a misguided social media post. It’s strangely ironic that he portrays Erik ten Hag poorly even in his absence.