David Raya put in a match-winning performance in Arsenal’s 1-0 win over Sporting CP on Tuesday. Not for the first time, he showed how important he is to his team.
A goalkeeper who plays behind a solid defence like Arsenal’s is always going to be prone to being underrated.
With Gabriel Magalhães and William Saliba providing a near-impenetrable wall at the heart of the backline, David Raya takes up a role as a spectator more than any other goalkeeper. Arsenal are allowing their opponents by far the fewest shots on target per game in the Premier League this season (2.3), while nobody is allowing fewer than them in the Champions League (2.9).
Raya watches on for long periods in Arsenal’s games. It would be understandable for critics to question how much he contributes – and if he might be expendable – but it is also simultaneously entirely unfair to do so.
A role like his brings with it other challenges, not least in that he has long phases of play without much involvement in the game, but still has to remain razor sharp, mentally as much as physically, when the ball does come his way.
Also, what happens when that watertight defence starts to show cracks? He has the extra challenge of dealing with the added scrutiny on top of the fact that he has more work to do.
In recent weeks, Arsenal haven’t been as secure in defence as they were earlier in the season. They lost back-to-back cup games to Manchester City and Southampton, and have allowed their opponents at least 0.5 xG in each of their last 10 games, having done so just five times in their 10 games before that.
And the past few games have highlighted beyond any doubt just how crucial Raya is to the team’s cause.
After a difficult couple of weeks, Arsenal needed a win more than a good performance in Tuesday night’s Champions League quarter-final first leg against Sporting CP. They underwhelmed in attack, relying largely on set-pieces for their best chances – until Kai Havertz came off the bench to score the winning goal in open play – but they were also vulnerable at the back, particularly to Sporting’s fast, direct play.
Sporting started quickly, becoming the first team in any competition this season to have 4+ shots in the first 10 minutes of a game against Arsenal. The first of those was their best chance of the game, when Maxi Araújo raced onto a straight ball in behind Ben White, only to see his effort crash off the underside of the crossbar. Replays showed Raya had got a crucial fingertip on the ball.
It was one of five saves Raya made over the 90 minutes as Arsenal secured a clean sheet and a win that puts one foot in the semi-finals ahead of next week’s return leg in London. In a tight game, Raya was their match-winner, and it was far from the first time he has been the difference for Arsenal since his move to the Emirates.
We can use expected goals on target (xGOT) to measure the precise importance of a goalkeeper’s contributions. This metric measures the likelihood of an on-target shot resulting in a goal, based on the combination of the chance quality (xG value) and the end location of the shot within the goalmouth.
Each shot is given a value between zero and one, where zero represents a shot that will never result in a goal and one represents a shot that is expected to be scored every single time. So, a shot from a good position that is placed into the corner of the goal will score highly in the xGOT model – because it is more difficult for the goalkeeper to save.
We can compare xGOT with goals conceded to put a value on how many goals a goalkeeper has ‘prevented’ with his saves (compared to the ‘average’ goalkeeper, who would concede goals precisely in line with the model).
On Tuesday night, Sporting racked up 1.57 xGOT but Raya stopped every shot he faced, so he ‘prevented’ 1.57 goals. And since the start of last season, the Spaniard has prevented more goals with his saves than any other goalkeeper in the Champions League (9.2). This season alone, he ranks third, with 3.6 goals prevented.
One limitation of the goals prevented measure is that it favours goalkeepers who face lots of shots on target, and therefore have more opportunities to save shots, or ‘prevent’ goals.
We can use goals prevented rate instead, though, which standardises for the number of shots faced. This is the number of goals a goalkeeper is expected to concede (xGOT) for every goal they actually concede.
Raya’s goals prevented rate of 2.0 in the Champions League this season suggests that for every two goals he ‘should’ concede based on the quality of the shots he has faced, he actually only concedes one. It is by a distance the best of every goalkeeper in the competition in 2025-26 (four goalkeepers in second place on 1.3).
He has saved 90% of the shots on target he has faced in the Champions League this season, which is by far the best of any goalkeeper, and also the fourth best (500+ mins played) in any season on record in the competition (since 2003-04). The best such rate was recorded by Jens Lehmann, who did not concede a single goal in 648 minutes on the pitch in 2005-06, the last time Arsenal made the Champions League final. Lehmann was sent off at 0-0 before Arsenal went on to lose that final against Barcelona 2-1.
Raya’s performance in Lisbon came in stark contrast to that of stand-in stopper, Kepa Arrizabalaga, in the EFL Cup final defeat to City. Kepa was yellow-carded for taking out Jérémy Doku shortly before fumbling a cross to allow Nico O’Reilly to open the scoring. Although Kepa didn’t do anything as costly against Southampton, Raya’s Champions League display this week has only served to highlight his absence at St Mary’s. Many are now wondering if Arsenal would still be in the FA Cup if Raya had played.
There’s no way of knowing that for sure. Raya might have kept Ross Stewart’s opening goal out. His sheer presence may have meant White did not commit the error that led to that goal. Or he may have made no difference whatsoever.
He may also not have put in such an exceptional performance at Sporting had he played 90 minutes at the weekend. Raya has played every second of every Arsenal game in the Premier League this season plus 10 of their 11 Champions League games, missing only the league-phase dead rubber against Kairat Almaty.
There is a chance that fatigue is contributing, with mistakes starting to creep in, too. Only one has been punished – for Wolves’ equaliser in second-half stoppage time in February – but he has also dropped a few crosses while under pressure, including against Sunderland and Brentford, and he has also misplaced some simple passes, including playing one straight to Carlos Baleba early on at Brighton, in recent weeks, only to see Gabriel make a goal-line clearance to spare his blushes.
Perhaps Raya would have dropped as big a clanger as Kepa had he played at Wembley against City. Or perhaps there would have been an error at Sporting if he had faced Southampton. There’s no way of knowing, but one thing is certainly reasonable to suggest, and that is that rest could well be helping him and Arsenal in the long run.
And after that break, he looks refreshed and raring to go for the run-in. Now that Arsenal are out of the domestic cups, Raya will surely play in all of their remaining games in 2025-26. Mikel Arteta’s side will only be stronger for it.
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