SOCCER/ ENGLISH LEAGUE CUP FINAL: ALEX FERGUSON hailed Ben Foster as an England first-choice goalkeeper-in-waiting after the youngster's fine penalty shoot-out save from Jamie O'Hara proved pivotal in Manchester United claiming the English League Cup to complete the first leg of what would be an unprecedented quadruple of trophies.
Foster, who had spent the moments before the penalties watching footage on an iPod of Tottenham Hotspur’s players taking recent penalties, dived to his left to palm away the luckless O’Hara’s attempt, Tottenham’s first after the teams had failed to muster a goal in 120 minutes. David Bentley’s subsequent effort wide of the left-hand post served to wrest the cup from the Londoners.
It fell to United’s Brazilian midfielder, Anderson, to confirm a 4-1 shoot-out success, though victory owed much to Foster, whose saves, particularly from Aaron Lennon in normal time, had helped to prolong parity.
“The future is his, the present belongs to (Edwin) van der Sar, that’s obvious,” said Ferguson while his players celebrated claiming the season’s first major trophy out on the pitch.
“Myself and the coaching staff have always had great faith in him but, having now had that experience in a final, that will strengthen his own belief. I think he’ll be England’s goalkeeper for the next number of years.
“I just pray he has more luck with injuries than he’s had in the last few years. But he’s proved he is a strong character, a very strong character.
“He has to have been to have come through two cruciate knee injuries the way he has. You map out a programme (for injured players), to do this or that after the operation, but it takes a tremendous amount of sacrifice to stick to it, and recover to do what he did today.”
Foster, who first suffered cruciate damage before joining United, has made only seven appearances for the club since joining from Stoke City in 2005 – he spent two seasons on loan at Watford – with his progress hampered by more ligament damage sustained in the summer of 2007, and by Van der Sar’s excellent form.
This, though, proved to be his moment with his save from O’Hara partly down to the quick reminder on the midfielder’s style from the spot gleaned from the iPod.
“I did a bit of research for the penalties,” said the 25-year-old. “We tried to find out everything we could about Spurs beforehand and, just before the shoot-out, I was looking at a video on an iPod with Eric Steele, our goalkeeping coach, and Edwin.
“It’s a new innovation he’s brought in since coming to the club and on it were some of Tottenham’s penalties, including one from O’Hara.
“I was told that, if he was taking one, to stay as big as I can. Edwin hasn’t got a bad record with penalties and he just told me to be as intimidating as possible. I stood up for as long as I could, and it is great it worked out for me.”
Foster has been capped once, by Steve McClaren in 2007, though he was watched here by the England coach, Fabio Capello, as United took the first step towards their potential quadruple.
The champions are seven points clear of Chelsea in the Premier League with a game in hand having benefited from Liverpool’s defeat at Middlesbrough on Saturday, drew the first leg of their Champions League knock-out match at Inter last week, and will travel to Fulham at the weekend seeking to progress into the FA Cup semi-finals.
Guardian Service
