Inter Milan laughing all the way to the bank with Onana

Carlo Garganese

• 4 Oct 2023 07:00 CDT
• 4 min read

When Inter Milan sold Andre Onana to Man Utd this past summer and replaced him with a 34-year-old Yann Sommer the overwhelming consensus was that Inter had massively downgraded.

After all, Onana had been arguably the best goalkeeper in the Champions League last season, keeping the most clean sheets in the competition as Inter reached the final. Furthermore, Onana earned a reputation as the best goalkeeper in the world with the ball at his feet - a key weapon for the modern goalkeeper.

Sommer, meanwhile, was considered as merely a steady goalkeeper who had never got close to reaching an elite level during almost a decade at Borussia Monchengladbach. He had moved to Bayern Munich as emergency cover for the injured Manuel Neuer in January but Bayern never saw a longer future for him and agreed to sell to Inter in July for €6.75m.

ANDRE ONANA: The warning signs that Man Utd missed at Inter Milan

Expectations for Inter fans weren’t very high. But so far things could barely have gone much better for the Swiss.

In nine games for Inter this season in all competitions, Sommer has kept six clean sheets.

He has conceded only four goals and - aside from a minor mistake for Nedim Bajrami’s goal in the game against Sassuolo - he has barely put a foot wrong.

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He has been a calming presence in goal and, while not at the level of Onana in terms of distribution, has been strong in this area with his feet, too.

Sommer has been particularly impressive in Europe. He made a string of crucial saves with Inter trailing 1-0 at Real Sociedad in Champions League matchday one. This allowed Lautaro Martinez to rescue a late draw. And on Tuesday in matchday two against Benfica he made a big save at 0-0 before Inter went on to dominate but only win 1-0.

Inter have been flying with Sommer and do not appear so far to be missing Onana at all.

They are top of Serie A with six wins from seven matches, having scored the most goals and conceded the least. They are also joint-top of their Champions League group with Real Sociedad after two games.

Onana struggles for Man Utd

Compare that with Onana and Man Utd’s fortunes so far this season.

He has conceded 18 goals in 10 games for United, keeping just three clean sheets.

He has also made a string of costly errors. The most recent were in Tuesday’s 3-2 home defeat to Galatasaray in the Champions League.

Onana passed the ball directly to Dries Mertens through on goal in the second-half, which led to the Belgian being wiped out by Casemiro inside the penalty area and a red card for the Brazilian.

He then failed to stop a fairly routine Mauro Icardi shot, with Onana crouching down to let the Argentine chip him to seal a 3-2 Galatasaray win.

Before that, in Champions League matchday one, he made a catastrophic error for Bayern Munich’s opener by Leroy Sane.

These poor performances have contributed to Man Utd’s worst start to a season in pushing on 40 years.

They are 10th in the Premier League, bottom and pointless in their Champions League group, and have lost six of their 10 games in all competitions. As a result, there are increasing calls for Man Utd manager Erik ten Hag to be sacked.

While it is still too early to write Onana off, Inter are certainly smiling by the way things are panning out.