Leeds ace has just done something no other Premier League star has for 70 years
Illan Meslier keeps racking up the impressive stats in his maiden Premier League season for Leeds United.
The latest is that he’s become the first Premier League keeper for 70 years to keep a clean sheet against Arsenal, Chelsea and Man United in his debut English top-flight season.
The latest shutout came in the 0-0 against Man United last weekend.
The impressive stat was posted by Opta man Jonny Cooper who added that the last keeper to do it was Ted Ditchburn for Tottenham in 1950/51.
How good can Meslier be?
That’s the question that Leeds fans are asking themselves at the moment.
Just yesterday we were talking about records tumbling. In February he had kept the most clean sheets in a single season by a keeper under the age of 21.
He also recorded the most starts for a keeper his age in a single season.
In April he beat Joe Hart’s record and became the youngest Premier League keeper to keep 10 clean sheets.
All these records were broken in a season when Leeds started with a pretty shocking defensive record.
We talked about injuries back then while critics were talking about Marcelo Bielsa’s naivety.
Since Diego Llorente has come back from injury things have looked a lot more secure at the back – Leeds have only conceded four in the last six games, which have included clashes with Man City, Liverpool and Man United.
As for Meslier, we think he will be the France number one in the future and at £5m he’s looking like one of the biggest bargains of Victor Orta’s reign.
In other Leeds United news, Dermot Gallagher delivers definitive verdict on controversial Leeds incident in 0-0 v Man Utd