Xabi Mancisidor has been at Manchester City so long that he owns relative autonomy over the goalkeeping department. A coach who joined with Manuel Pellegrini in 2011 and persuaded to stay on under Pep Guardiola can lay claim to have left a substantial mark on this title race.
Without Mancisidor, it is unlikely that Stefan Ortega would be part of this squad. Somebody else comes on for Ederson at Tottenham and maybe it’s a different outcome. Maybe they don’t fling a leg at Heung-min Son’s late one-on-one. Maybe they are not then called the ‘best keeper in the world’ by Rodri.
City plucked Ortega from Arminia Bielefeld on a free transfer two years ago and Mancisidor drove that particular deal, regularly messaging and ringing the German in a bid to convince him. Guardiola leans on his goalkeeping coach to make the calls in that area and he’s got this one spot on.
Ortega had just been relegated from the Bundesliga. He is not capped by his country. When at 1860 Munich, he contemplated giving up and going into the armed forces.
He’d never really pulled up any trees and on his first day at City, the frightening quality on show at training led him to call his agent and complain that this had all been a massive mistake. Even the defenders were whistling efforts by Ortega’s ears that day.
Stefan Ortega came off the bench and put in a heroic performance against Tottenham on Tuesday
He denied Heung-min Son when the forward was through on goal late on
He also kept out two efforts from Dejan Kulusevski after coming off the bench
He’d thought long and hard about whether to make the move, Ortega on record as saying there were more lucrative financial packages on offer elsewhere. First-team football was the opposite of guaranteed but Mancisidor’s persistence had been a determining factor.
Ortega told himself to give it a year as Ederson’s No 2 and if it didn’t work out, then he’d leave. He ended that year having played in an all-Manchester FA Cup final and winning a Treble.
In Istanbul, Ortega stayed up drinking all night with the goalkeeping group, with Ederson, Scott Carson, Mancisidor and Richard Wright.
He values the bonds they have created, his relationship with Carson described as special. Bayern Munich came calling in the weeks after and City said they had no intention of letting go somebody who had impressed whenever called upon but, perhaps more importantly, raised Ederson’s levels in…