Senne Lammens will always appreciate hearing positive comments from goalkeepers he grew up watching, like Edwin van der Sar.
The legendary Dutch stopper was the Sky Sports studio guest for Monday’s broadcast of Everton v United, and, therefore, in prime position to see Senne keep a first clean sheet on the road this season.
It was a difficult final 20 minutes for the Belgian in particular, as Everton launched an aerial bombardment in search of a late equaliser and surrounded him at set-pieces.
Fortunately, Lammens emerged from the gauntlet unscathed, making several key interventions and he was later named Man of the Match, both by the broadcasters and United supporters.
The performance impressed Edwin, viewed as one of the club’s greatest goalkeepers after the role he played during our 2008 UEFA Champions League success.
“With your age, in your first year in the Premier League, you’re really doing incredibly well,”
Edwin told our current custodian.
“And you have a good save, good hands, so compliments on your all-round game.”
Senne, after 48 hours of reflecting on events at Hill Dickinson Stadium, emphasised the impact of those words.
Speaking during an appearance at Partington Central Academy, one of our Foundation’s partner schools, he said: “Edwin’s someone I’ve grown up looking towards and looking up to, so it’s always nice to hear from him, to hear positive words.
“Any comparison with him, or with Peter Schmeichel, is always nice to hear.
“We are quite similar – he’s from the Netherlands and I’m from Belgium – it’s not far from each other, so we also know a little bit about character and background.
“I think it’s quite similar, so it’s always nice to hear those nice words from him.”
Boss Michael Carrick, who played with van der Sar between 2006 and the Dutchman’s retirement five years later, has acknowledged the parallels in personality between the two, without wanting to get too carried away.
“I don’t want to be comparing them because I don’t think it’s fair to Senne, but there’s definitely similarities,” he said. “For me, he’s a goalkeeper to be reliable, to be trustworthy and, instead of creating the chaos, you want him to take the chaos away and calm things down. I think Senne is that.
“He’s quite quiet at times and unassuming but he’s got a real steeliness.”
Lammens is in the running for February’s Player of the Month award, after helping United to three wins and a draw across our four Premier League outings.
He’s up against Harry Maguire and Benjamin Sesko in the vote, which closes on Saturday, and is glad to get the recognition alongside his team-mates.
“Those are nice things to add to the wins,”
he added.
“I think even being in the mix for it, with those guys as well, is a nice thing to hear, because they’ve had really good games as well.
“It’s always nice, but we just have to keep going and we’ll see.”