Real Madrid’s Courtois felt he was due more respect – so he made his saves, and his point

Real Madrid had just won the Champions League, and amid all the celebrations at the Stade de France, Thibaut Courtois had something he wanted to get off his chest.

“Today, I needed to win a final — for my career, for all the hard work, to put respect on my name because I don’t think I have enough respect, especially in England,” Courtois told UK broadcaster BT Sport. “I saw a lot of criticism that I was not good enough or whatever.”

This was what was going through the head of the 30-year-old Belgium international, who had just been named man of the match after a phenomenal, Champions League-record nine saves in the 1-0 win over Liverpool, ensuring that Vinicius Junior’s second-half strike was enough to secure the trophy.

The euphoria of the moments following a Champions League final win might seem a strange moment to be thinking of past criticism, but Courtois saw the highest-profile opportunity possible to settle some scores. And he was not going to miss his chance.

He had won plenty before last night — three La Liga titles with Real and before that city rivals Atletico, two Premier Leagues with Chelsea, a Europa League with Atletico, but no Champions League. Many of his team-mates already had four when they arrived in Paris this week, while his predecessor Keylor Navas won three in as many seasons as Madrid’s undisputed No 1. 

Courtois was also well aware that despite his success he was often not in the conversation when people talked about the world’s best keeper — which stung him.

It seems quite remarkable, but British football magazine FourFourTwo omitted him in a feature listing their top 10 goalkeepers in the world just two months ago. Chelsea’s current first-choice Edouard Mendy was number one, David de Gea of Manchester United second and Bayern Munich’s Manuel Neuer third. Others in the top 10 included Liverpool’s Alisson, Athletic Bilbao’s Unai Simon, Yassine Bounou of Sevilla and Atletico Madrid’s Jan Oblak.

Often players will shrug off such rankings by journalists or fans, or claim to not even notice, but Courtois felt he had to respond.

“They discredit themselves,” he said angrily at the time. “It is clear that the people who voted do not know anything.”

Courtois is aware that he is not fashionable. He is a classic big, tall, agile keeper who makes lots of saves, in the mould of his childhood role model Edwin van der Sar, the former Manchester United and Netherlands No 1. More popular with most pundits and coaches in recent years have been ‘sweeper-keepers’ such as Neuer, Alisson, Manchester City’s Ederson and Marc Andre ter Stegen of Barcelona.

While Courtois has worked hard to improve his passing out from the back, he has never really looked comfortable doing it. Unlike some of his peers, nobody is going to, jokingly or not, suggest he could do a job in midfield if the team needed him.

It also took Courtois quite a while to win acceptance at Real Madrid.

On arrival from Chelsea in the summer of 2018, he had to edge out Navas. Courtois always had the support of club president Florentino Perez, but the Costa Rican was very popular in the dressing room, and with the fans. Even after Navas was moved to Paris Saint-Germain 12 months later, Courtois was still not universally accepted. He was even whistled at the Bernabeu in his second season, getting substituted at half-time after being at fault for both goals as Club Bruges led 2-0 in an early-season group fixture.

The one person who never had any doubt that Courtois would succeed at Madrid was… Courtois himself.

Soon after the Bruges game, sources have told The Athletic, he had learned that the pressure and spotlight at Madrid was “nothing like” he had experienced before at Chelsea, during three seasons on loan at Atletico from 2011 or with a national team rated as one of the best in the world. But he was taking these new higher demands on board and making sure to deal with them.

Asked in April 2020 for his own ranking of goalkeepers for different attributes, Courtois chose Oblak for saves, and Ter Stegen for distribution. But when asked for ‘mentality’, he replied: “It’s difficult to know other goalkeepers mentally, so I will put myself — also for all that has happened to me over the last year and a half. If you are not very strong mentally, then you cannot survive.”

That 2019-20 season ended with Courtois being one of Madrid’s key players as they won the Spanish title, and with him personally picking up the Zamora Trophy as La Liga’s best keeper.

By that point he was popular with the Bernabeu crowd but still, making friends was not too high on his list of priorities, or at least that is the impression he gives off. While being well respected by his team-mates, Courtois has not become close to the leadership group within the Madrid dressing room. He has also not been shy about pointing publicly to problems elsewhere in the team.

“I don’t know if we deserved to win, in the first half I made some great saves,” Courtois said on TV following a shaky 2-1 win at Celta Vigo in early April where he was named man of the match for three superb stops after Madrid’s defence had opened up and allowed the home side chances.

That has also been the story of much of Madrid’s 2021-22 season. With the possible exception of Karim Benzema, Courtois was the most important player as Carlo Ancelotti’s team easily regained the title. And he has been even better, and busier, in the Champions League.

Going into last night’s final, Courtois had already made far more saves than any other keeper in the competition, with 50 in his 12 games. By comparison, Alisson of fellow finalists Liverpool had been called upon just 14 times in his dozen appearances. Many of Courtois’ saves were also vital — such as the penalty stop from Lionel Messi to keep the game goalless in the last 16 first leg at Paris Saint-Germain, and the toenail that redirected Jack Grealish’s late point-blank effort in the semi-final second leg that would have put Manchester City 6-3 up on aggregate at the Bernabeu.

He was also not shy of talking up his own ability on those occasions — asked about the penalty save from Messi, he said on TV afterwards that “I knew he had missed three shooting to the right, so I played with him a bit on the line”. The message was that he had won the battle of nerves with the world’s best player.

Speaking to the international media during the open day at Madrid’s training ground last week, Courtois was both open and spiky. “After losing a final, I know what it means to win,” he said, when asked how this year with Madrid was different from his 2014 experience of losing the Champions League showpiece with Atletico.

Then, on the eve of the final, he also sent a dart to Atletico fans who have never forgiven his switch across the divide in the Spanish capital, via four years with Chelsea. “This time I am on the right side of history,” he said when asked for the difference between now and eight years ago in Lisbon, surely aware that this would be a painful blow for his old team’s fans to accept. But he evidently did not care, as he knew he was right.

This Madrid team, especially this season under Carlo Ancelotti, have managed to build a situation where they are answering their critics. Many around the club did not expect much success this term, especially in Europe. Few around the Bernabeu really fancied them to win against PSG, Chelsea and City in the last 16, quarter-finals and semis, but confidence and momentum kept building with each even more unlikely comeback.

Coming into last night’s final, they knew many outsiders had Liverpool as favourites, but it did not bother them, they just expected to win, by hook or by crook. And they did. It was not a performance for the purists, there were plenty of long balls, lots of low-block defending and last-ditch clearances. But they got there. 

Whether Courtois was consciously thinking about his critics as he kept blocking shots from Mohamed Salah, Sadio Mane and others, the will to prove people wrong was driving him on.

“I said at the press conference yesterday that when Madrid play in finals, they win,” Courtois also said on the Stade de France pitch after the final whistle. “I saw a lot of tweets saying I would get humbled. It was the other way round. Liverpool were very strong today. I think I played a great game and that was the difference.”

It was just something that had to be said, and Courtois had earned the opportunity to make his point.

(Top photo: Charlotte Wilson/Offside/Offside via Getty Images)