5 incredible Premier League goalkeepers who didn’t make Jamie Carragher’s top 10

Nestor Watach • 24 Feb 2026

Jamie Carragher has named his 10 best Premier League goalkeepers of all time, and there can be little arguing some of the exceptional shot-stoppers at the top end of his list.

Here’s Carragher’s full list in order: Petr Cech, Peter Schmeichel, Alisson, David De Gea, Thibaut Courtois, Edwin van der Sar, Ederson, Neville Southall, David Seaman and Pepe Reina.

But what about the best keepers who missed out? We’ve picked out five who easily could – and maybe should – have made Carragher’s top 10.

Jens Lehmann

Carragher’s list was dominated by legendary keepers who have won multiple Premier League titles. Ederson, Alisson, Cech, Schmeichel. Fair enough.

Lehmann was a rare title-winning ‘keeper overlooked by the former Liverpool defender, who snuck his old team-mate Pepe Reina in at tenth place.

Carra made a solid case for the Spaniard, citing his clean sheet ratio and three successive Premier League Golden Gloves, but he can’t match Lehmann’s peak.

The German was well worth his reputation as having a screw loose, something he’s kept up post-retirement by attacking his neighbour’s garage with a chainsaw, but he was almost faultless in 2003-04.

He played every minute of the Gunners’ Invincible season, an achievement only possible with a dependable keeper between the sticks.

The Golden Glove award didn’t exist until the following season, but Arsenal’s No.1 kept the most clean sheets (15) and boasted the best defensive record (26 goals conceded).

Lehmann was blessed to play behind an incredible defence, sure, but he deserves his fair share of credit for that historic campaign.

Emiliano Martinez

People scoff at Martinez’s status as “the best in the world” – recognised by two FIFA ‘The Best’ awards and two Yashin Trophies in recent years.

Those individual accolades were almost entirely won off the back of his big-game heroics for Argentina at major tournaments, a penalty-saving monster in the Copa America and World Cup.

You only have to look at his save to deny Randal Kolo Muani in the World Cup final to find evidence of his clutch gene. The Didier Drogba of goalkeepers; saving his very best for cup finals.

What’s that got to do with the Premier League? That’s a fair question. Great as he’s been for Aston Villa, based on the club game alone you probably wouldn’t put him up there with the likes of Gianluigi Donnarumma and Thibaut Courtois as the best in the world right now.

But people have a tendency to go too far the other way. Yes, he’s a sh*thouse. Yes, he’s had the odd blunder. But he is absolutely exceptional on his day.

For all the churlish criticism Martinez gets, Villa are dramatically outperforming their ‘xG against’ this season – they’re lucky to have a World Cup-winning, modern-day icon keeping them on track for a top-four finish.

Nigel Martyn

Anyone under the age of 30 probably doesn’t realise quite how good Martyn was. Carra doesn’t have the excuse of youth.

Britain’s first million-pound goalkeeper, Martyn was undoubtedly world-class in his 1990s pomp. There’s little debate over his standing as the best goalkeeper in Leeds United’s history.

Leeds fans will tell you how Martyn ought to have been England’s No.1 ahead of a fading David Seaman in 2002. And they probably have a case – he surely wouldn’t have lobbed by Ronaldinho.

Carragher went with Neville Southall, but conceded the Everton shot-stopper was better – “the best in the world” – during his pre-’92 heyday.

Southall was still better than decent in his latter years, but if we’re talking Premier League era we’re choosing Martyn all day long.

Joe Hart

Lucky that the word “mogged” didn’t exist when he was done by Andrea Pirlo’s Panenka at Euro 2012.

Kids these days are obsessed with aura, and you could feel Hart’s fade away in that very moment. He arguably never quite recovered from that point on.

Pirlo’s panenka kicked off a series of unfortunate events in the latter half of Hart’s career – from being deemed obsolete on day one by Pep Guardiola to forgettable stints at West Ham and Burnley, to the brutal exposure of a curious cant-dive-to-his-left fatal flaw.

All that being more fresh in the memory means we tend to forget just how good Hart was in his younger years.

He matched Pepe Reina’s achievement of three successive Golden Gloves in the early 2010s – something no keeper has managed since – and he was particularly outstanding in Man City’s rollercoaster 2011-12 title victory.

Given that peak, in which he won every domestic honour and two league titles, there’s certainly a case to be made that he was more worthy of inclusion than David de Gea, who stayed longer at the top but endured a similar trajectory of slow decline.

Jordan Pickford

Like Martinez, there’s a case to be made that Pickford has saved his best for the international stage.

But even ignoring his spotless record for the Three Lions for almost a decade, he’s been a similarly reliable for just as long at Everton.

There’s a parallel universe in which Pickford moved to a big six club and has playing in the Champions League year in, year out. His spectacular shot-stopping ability makes him worthy of that level. Maybe then he’d have got his dues.

In this realm, Pickford has been superb for an often basket-case Everton side. During their years of circling the plughole, he was arguably their most influential figure in avoiding the drop.

God knows where they’d be without him. The Championship, probably.

TRY A QUIZ: Can you name every goalkeeper to have scored a Premier League goal?

Jamie Carragher Lists And Rankings Popular