Paul Scholes Questions Manchester United's Lammens as Top Class Goalkeeper
Paul Scholes has never been one to sugar-coat a verdict, and this time his gaze has fallen squarely on Manchester United’s new man between the posts.
The former midfielder has delivered a blunt assessment of 24-year-old Belgian keeper Lammens, who arrived from Royal Antwerp for £21.7 million last summer and has already forced Altay Bayindir out of the starting line-up. For all that rapid progress, Scholes is not convinced United have yet found the calibre of goalkeeper needed to drag them back to the top.
On The Good, The Bad and The Football podcast, he cut straight to the heart of it. “What team have you seen win the Premier League without a top class goalkeeper?” he asked. “Lammens might be that, I don't know, I think the jury's probably still out on that and then you build from the back four.”
That line – “the jury's still out” – hangs over Old Trafford like a verdict deferred.
United are trying to piece together a new identity under Michael Carrick, and Scholes clearly believes the reconstruction has to start where all their greatest sides began: at the back. He pointed to the way recent challengers have done it, with a defensive base set in stone before anything else was added.
For Scholes, the template is obvious. “It's the way Arsenal started three or four years ago, defensively they have been absolutely brilliant. You need a top class goalkeeper.
“You think of Liverpool's team with Alisson, Raya at Arsenal, Man United with Peter Schmeichel and Edwin van der Sar. They've all got brilliant, brilliant goalkeepers. You start from the back, of course you do. Whether Michael's just got to be patient and wait for that, I don't know.”
The implication is clear enough. If Lammens cannot grow into that level, Carrick may eventually have to look elsewhere. The position is too important, the margins at the top too thin.
Lammens knows exactly what he has walked into. A young foreign goalkeeper at Manchester United, replacing an established rival, arriving with a sizeable fee and a fanbase conditioned by Schmeichel and Van der Sar – there is nowhere to hide. He has spoken openly about the intensity of the English game and the scrutiny that comes with it.
“That's England for you,” he said last year. “If things go badly, they can bury you deep, but if things go well, they praise you to the skies.
“I take that with a grain of salt, because to be mentioned in the same sentence as Schmeichel, I'm going to have to prove myself many more times. But I did find it a very nice compliment. I hope to play here for 10 years and be important, so that, like Schmeichel and Van der Sar, I can leave a legacy.”
Those are big words, and they were thrown back into the spotlight after a bruising Manchester derby in which Lammens could not keep out Erling Haaland. The defeat was not his alone – United were second best across the pitch – but Scholes’ decision to zoom in on the goalkeeper tells its own story. In games of that magnitude, he clearly believes an undisputed, world-class No 1 can tilt the balance.
Now every United match becomes a running test case. Every strong claim, every fingertip save, every misjudged cross will be weighed against Scholes’ standard and the ghosts of Schmeichel and Van der Sar. The Premier League is unforgiving, and for a 24-year-old still adapting to its chaos, the margin for error is thin.
Lammens wants a decade at Old Trafford and a legacy to match the greats. The question, sharpened by Scholes’ challenge, is simple: can he convince a club built on elite goalkeepers that he belongs in that company?
