Sheffield United key man pledges to keep proving doubters wrong after Man City star turn

Wes Foderingham has pledged to continue silencing his doubters after another star turn in Sheffield United’s narrow defeat to Manchester City at the weekend. The former Rangers man made a number of fine saves and did not deserve to be on the losing side as the reigning champions won 2-1 late on.

The 32-year-old has now played in all four of England’s top divisions, plus the Scottish Premiership, but had to wait until earlier this month to make his English top-flight debut after spending United’s last season in the Premier League as Aaron Ramsdale’s No.2. Despite establishing himself as United’s first-choice goalkeeper in the years since, usurping international Robin Olsen and seeing off the challenges of Michael Verrips and Adam Davies, some sections of the fanbase have continued to clamour for a new goalkeeper, with former loanee Dean Henderson, Uğurcan Çakır and Sam Johnstone amongst those mentioned on social media.

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But there was always a great deal of confidence in Foderingham behind the scenes at Shirecliffe, where the former Swindon Town man is a popular figure for his personality as well as his on-field performances. His biggest challenge yet came against City on Sunday and he responded, making fine saves from Julian Alvarez and Erling Haaland in particular before goals from Haaland and Rodri sentenced United to their third defeat in three so far this season - and surely their most cruel.

“I’ve had to answer critics at any level I’ve played at,” Foderingham said afterwards. Right from the start of my career there are always people that have doubted me and I’ve always proved them wrong. And I’ll continue to do that. People doubt me and I’ll continue to prove them wrong. That’s just part and parcel of being a goalkeeper itself and part of improving as a person as well.”

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Next up in the league for United, who kick off their Carabao Cup campaign at home to Lincoln City on Wednesday night, is a tasty-looking clash with Everton, who are bottom of the table and also without a win from their three games so far. “When you have an opportunity to pick up points in any fixture you want to get them on the board,” Foderingham added. “There are games there we think we can get points and we’ll improve over the course of the season.

“One thing about the boys in the dressing room is that we’re up for a fight, and we know we’ll need all the fight in the world to try and stay in this division. The vibe in the dressing room is positive, there are encouraging signs and I expect us to improve more over the course of the season. In the last three games, we’ve made improvements in each of them.

“We deserved a point at Forest, but a late goal did us, and against City I felt we deserved one as well. They’re the best side in the world so we knew it’d be difficult but for the majority of the game we stuck to the task and gave them a football match. It’s just disappointing to concede such a late goal. But we’ve improved and there are a lot of encouraging signs there.”