Martin Dubravka: back to his best?

Newcastle United goalkeeper Martin Dubravka has had to watch on from the sidelines for an awful lot of this season before being brought in from the cold and his latest performance in the win at Burnley has got the tongues wagging of Toon fans.

He had no chance of stopping Matej Vydra’s first half effort but after that, the Slovakian looked like he was not going to beaten again and made plenty fine stops as we eventually saw out the game 2-1.

His shot stopping abilities have had to be on display from the first moment he walked through the door with teams often being allowed the luxury of peppering his goal with efforts and this was the case at Turf Moor.

His most notable stops include denying Dwight McNeil and Matt Lowton of long range efforts whilst none were more vital or impressive as the save he made to prevent Paul Dummett from converting into his own net.

But is the Slovakian international back to his best? In my opinion, there were still areas of his game that were found wanting. Burnley’s game plan was evidently to get crosses into the box and crosses near the goalkeeper and in my opinion Dubravka was a bit shaky in how he dealt with the said barrage of crosses.

On countless occasion he chose to flap and punch rather than to claim it and he got a bit fortunate and on another day could have gifted the hosts a goal.

In addition, Dubravka’s kicking has never been his strong suit but since returning from injury it seems to have gotten worse, much worse.

His goal kicks and long punts up the pitch often resulted in Burnley throw ins and this is not ideal for a side that already has barely any of the ball.

Perhaps this is a bit harsh on Dubravka, he is a player who I like enormously and I am not saying he was bad against Burnley far from it, just he has been better and I am sure he will be again.

He is only recently back into the side and I have 100% faith in the keeper that he can return to his brilliant best in the very near future.