Welly Nix: The Sudden Rise of Oli Sail, Starting Goalkeeper
Oli Sail did not play a single minute last season. He’d played four times in each of the previous two seasons, every time as a backup/alternate, but if he was planning on taking his career to the next level in Ufuk Talay’s first campaign in charge then that didn’t go so well. Stefan Marinovic was the main man new signing goalkeeper. Oli Sail once again was left to watch along from his seat on the bench only this time there were no reprieves - Marinovic played every single minute for the Nix in 2019-20.
What made matters worse for Sail was that after his little golf cart escapade with Tim Payne, which saw each suspended by the club for the first four games after the restart, Sail found himself out of the squad entirely even after he became available again. Youngster Zac Jones had filled in as backup and would remain there the rest of the way. Payne also missed the rest of that season but for him it was injury related, flying back to Aotearoa from the team’s A-League bubble in Sydney. Not so for Sail. He was simply dropped to third-string status.
Fast forward about 9-10 months from that point and now Oli Sail is the club’s number one. Zac Jones was released when his contract expired and he most recently stepped up to keep for Team Wellington down the stretch of their Premiership-winning season (and is currently wearing the gloves for Miramar Rangers in the Central League) while Oli Sail was maintained as Phoenix backup in large part because the decision had already been made: he was under contract for another season whereas Jones was not. So the fella was back to riding the pine for the first team... until a dud run of four points from the first six games led Uffie into a raft of changes.
It was a ‘home’ game against Western Sydney. Luke DeVere had been injured pretty badly the previous match so there were already defensive shake-ups on the way. Tim Payne slid into a central spot with Louis Fenton making his first start of the campaign on the right. Liam McGing came in to partner Payne after having only played 91 minutes total for the Nix in his first season and a bit. Cameron Devlin, returning from injury, was only on the bench hence for the first time we got an Alex Rufer/Clayton Lewis starting midfield duo. And after David Ball’s first half red card in the previous game (a 2-0 loss to Central Coast) in came Ben Waine for his first start of the term and just the third of his career. Mirza Muratovic also got the start with Tomer Hemed still out hurt.
Amidst all that there was also a change at goalkeeper. Oli Sail in for Stefan Marinovic with the poor form of the club to that point, as well as the injury/suspension crisis, seemingly giving Talay the freedom to shake everything up. What followed was an odd game in which the Nix scored early through Muratovic but didn’t look entirely sure of themselves at any point and seemed to be on the way to another defeat when Bruce Kamau scored in the 77th minute... only for an almost immediate Louis Fenton equaliser which earned a 2-2 draw. That was enough for Talay to stick with almost an entirely unchanged eleven for the subsequent match (Lewis dropping to the bench to accommodate Devlin being the only alteration) but the 2-0 loss to Melbourne Victory that followed was probably the low point of the entire campaign for the Nix.
Luckily Ball was back for the next match and with Clayton Lewis and Tim Payne now permanent fixtures in their new roles, the Nix strutted their way to a 2-0 win over Newcastle and a 3-0 win over Perth to get the train on the tracks finally. Including back to back clean sheets for a very impressive Oliver Sail, go on son. Just like Payne and Lewis he’s started every game since.
Ufuk Talay has a tendency to stick with players in form. Oli Sail could be the first to tell you that it’s a tough one when you’re on the other side of that ledger. If you’re waiting for the guy ahead of you to play themselves out then the only thing you can really control is making sure you don’t drop your standards at training and fall down the pecking order yourself. Ben Waine had a similar situation... before that WSW start he’d only played twenty minutes combined in those six games. He’s featured in every subsequent match and more recently he’s locked a first XI spot down after the goals began flowing. Alex Rufer is currently on the outer with the Lewis/Devlin combo in midfield taking care of business. James McGarry has been usurped by Sam Sutton too. In isolation there’s no way that Sam Sutton, a teenaged converted midfielder, is a better left back than McGarry, a specialist who has played top tier in the Netherlands, but Sutton has done well with his opportunities so it’s his spot to lose at the moment. That’s how this thing works.
Point being that Marinovic didn’t necessarily do anything wrong and he isn’t necessarily a worse keeper than Sail all of a sudden. That’s not what’s happened here. What’s happened is that the team wasn’t performing like it should have been and thus changes were made (Talay also being one more likely to change personnel than to change tactics). Sail came in and the team has gotten better. So it’s not to put Marinovic down to say that he’s now the reserve keeper, it’s only to raise Oli Sail up.
Having said that, let’s compare some numbers...
Stefan Marinovic: 6 games | 1.67 goals/90 | 67.9 save% | 0 clean sheets
Oliver Sail: 14 games | 1.36 goals/90 | 78.3 save% | 3 cleans sheets
And hey for kicks let’s chuck in the other New Zealand goalie to have played A-League minutes this term:
Max Crocombe: 10 games | 2.40 goals/90 | 58.9 save% | 2 clean sheets
Goalkeeping is the most individual of all positions, you’re the only one allowed to use your hands, right? But it’s no different to any other position where the performances of any keeper are intrinsically connected to the way the rest of the team is going, arguably even more so. Hence Stef’s efforts have to be kept in the context that he was playing behind a defensive unit that didn’t seem to have much idea what was going on. There’s a significant difference in save percentage there but Marinovic faced 4.7 shots on target per game, while Sail is facing 5.9 shots on target per game. In that light, Sail’s just had more saves to make whereas Marinovic was giving up fewer shots on target but arguably they were better quality shots, aka harder saves to make. All things to consider.
But it’s undeniable that Oli Sail has been great since he took the gloves. Marinovic’s biggest strength as a keeper is his shot stopping and Sail is matching him on that front, probably bettering him. That save percentage is up there with anyone in the league (it’s fourth overall behind Ryan Scott, Andrew Redmayne & Jamie Young). He’s also much better than SM in possession, a little more willing to use both feet (always important for keepers so as to not get trapped in the press) and he moves the ball win confidence. Plus fun fact: he’s actually slightly taller than Marinovic. 194cm to 191cm (although Stef weighs a decent chunk more).
The short odds on where he’d struggle would have been with the in-between aspects of goalkeeping. Communication, making decisive actions, general discipline, etc. But no dramas there. He’s probably not as reliable under the high ball as he could be but Steven Taylor and Tim Payne are both strong in the air and the Nix don’t face an abundance of crosses anyway. Not saying this lightly at all: Oli Sail has started 14 games in a row now, that’s a decent sample size, and there hasn’t really been a weakness to his game. There are some things he does better than others, sure, but nothing that can be exploited. He’s been tidy as. And under Uffie if you can play like that then it’s your spot to lose.
Sail has played games before for this club and this hasn’t been the case. He’s had superb performances amongst them but never has he looked so complete a goalie as this. He looks confident. He looks assured. He’s not making mistakes, there are no heart-in-mouth moments (not that he’s been responsible for, at least). These are not the performances of a backup keeper, these are Grown Man Number One performances.
For someone to go more than 600 days between first team appearances – despite almost always being available – to then take this opportunity in both (gloved) hands is pretty bloody impressive. You could see him looking more and more comfortable with each passing game during his first month or so as a starter to the stage where now this extended run of games has unlocked things for him. He knows he belongs at this level now... which gets awkward for the club because both he and Marinovic are off contract at the end of this season.
They’re gonna have to make a decisive call because whichever keeper isn’t given the number one vote of confidence is probably gonna leave... Western United have already tried to whisper in Sail’s ear and it’s not hard to imagine Stefan Marinovic ending up at a rival A-League club if he’s let loose. Or he could try his luck back in Europe, dunno. Ufuk Talay is yet to sign a new contract beyond this season either but it sounds like he’ll be back (Melbourne Victory went in a different direction after all) and once that’s done we should see a flurry of re-signings with a goalkeeping decision likely to be among them. But re-signings are a topic for a whole other article. That’s a next week kinda thing.
If you wanna support what we do then Patreon is the place to go, much gratitude
Also whack an ad, share the articles, tell your mates, and sign up to our Substack
Keep cool but care