Having a top-class goalkeeper between the posts can be the difference between winning and losing a game.

Football is a low-scoring sport so the intervention of the man in goal can be decisive. It means their performances are closely scrutinised by pundits and fans alike.

The stat boffins at the CIES Football Observatory have tried to rank every Premier League keeper. They have used an index from 0 to 100 to rate each shot-stopper using three separate criteria – which league the matches were played in, the results of the games, the deviation in the Save % compared to the expected value given to the defensive strength of the team they play for. It’s a complicated methodology.

Press the next page as we list CIES’s top five “best goalkeepers” in England’s top flight over the past 12 months.