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19 May 2024, 00:00

Mention his famous father to him and Kasper Schmeichel will roll his eyes. He may even yawn. The perception that he has stepped out of his father Peter’s shadow has always bored him to the extent he has frequently challenged journalists to write about him without mentioning the former Denmark and Manchester United goalkeeper.

But the fact that his father is one of the most famous and most decorated Danish footballers of all time is part of his story, because it has presented him with the greatest challenge of his career and provided the motivation to become one of Europe’s best goalkeepers in his own right.

Understandably, when he was taking his first tentative steps into professional football at Manchester City 17 years ago, while his father was the club’s No 1 goalkeeper in the twilight of his illustrious career, the comparisons will have been made. The bright blonde hair, the famous starfish stance when a striker is one-on-one, even the loud, vocal remonstrations and gestures towards his defenders when a chance is conceded, were all familiar.

(Photo: Martin Rickett – PA Images/PA Images via Getty Images)

However, Kasper has certainly ensured now that he has set his own legacy, rather than being part of his father’s, and he has achieved this through sheer single-mindedness and determination. Rather than ride on his father’s coattails, Kasper took the hard road, via Darlington, Bury, Falkirk, Cardiff City and Coventry City on loan, before dropping down to League Two with Notts County, then moving to Leeds United and finally Leicester, where he has become an influential figure on and off the field.

Even now, at the age of 33, he has adopted a new diet and fitness regime, he trains twice a day and still studies hours of video footage of other goalkeepers in his spare time as he strives to be the best he can be. The Leicester manager Brendan Rodgers is full of praise for him.

“He worked very, very hard when we came in, when we spoke to all the players about their condition – and to be up there at the elite level, it is important,” says Rodgers. “He looks after his body, he is fit, and you can see how lean he is. That helps his concentration and he has great energy. He is a leader within our squad.

“Coming in, he was very focused on being as fit as he possibly could and you have to, when you get older, be aware of your body. He is a model professional and he is very focused.”

He returned to the Etihad on Saturday no longer that fresh-faced teenager but instead one of the best goalkeepers in England and in his prime, although it was not a night to remember as Leicester lost to the reigning champions in what was only their third defeat of the season.

It was the first time Schmeichel had conceded more than two goals in a game under Rodgers but he was hardly culpable, being beaten by a deflection for the first, getting a fingertip on Ilkay Gundogan’s penalty for the second and being left helpless for Gabriel Jesus’s far-post tap-in after some brilliant play by Kevin De Bruyne. If it wasn’t for Schmeichel, the margin of victory could have been even greater.

“He and Jamie Vardy looked like top players,” Rodgers said after the game. “He made a couple of really good saves and it was his personality; that is the bridge that a lot of our younger players have to cross. It is just a process as they get better in big games like this.”

That process has been a long one for Schmeichel.

“It was always a difficult one because as his father’s career disappears into the past and while they will never forget the great Peter Schmeichel, there is a new generation who will remember the name Schmeichel through Kasper,” Derek Fazackerley, who was part of Sven Goran Eriksson’s backroom team at the Etihad when Kasper was coming through the ranks, tells The Athletic.

“What he has achieved at club and international level is helping him to do that. I am sure people will always remember Peter but Kasper is a fantastic goalkeeper in his own right.”

Rodgers said: “He probably doesn’t get the credit he deserves. There’s no doubt about that. Everyone talked about his father but this is a boy who, in his own right, has come through the hard way. He’s gone out on loan, up to Scotland, gone out to various clubs, living under that pressure.

“You can never imagine that, to play under the ‘Peter Schmeichel’s my dad’ tag, but that’s something he’s had to fight with all his life. And now it’s about Kasper Schmeichel, which he thoroughly deserves.”

A ten-year-old son Kasper (left) and Brian Laudrup’s seven-year-old son Nicolai hold the Euro 96 trophy at Wembley before their fathers played in the tournament (Photo: Adam Butler – PA Images/PA Images via Getty Images)

It is a cross he has always had to bear but it hasn’t weighed him down. Rather than being a help, it has often been a hindrance — but that has only motivated Kasper even more.

That drive to be a keeper has been there from an early age. Schmeichel signed for Manchester City as a 15-year-old, given a long-term contract covering schoolboy, scholar and professional terms, in September 2002 – just after his father had started his final playing season in what was the club’s farewell campaign at Maine Road. Fazackerley was already a coach there under Kevin Keegan before becoming assistant to Eriksson, and says it was clear that the younger Schmeichel – already nudging six feet tall – had a big future in the game.

“We signed his dad Peter in the latter stages of his career and Kasper would come in training at the time,” recalls Fazackerley, now assistant manager at Oxford United. “Obviously, you could see he had his dad’s ability.

“He had the opportunity to go to Manchester United at the time but he chose Manchester City. At the time, we had a clutch of very good goalkeepers. We had Kasper, we signed Joe Hart and we had Kieren Westwood. They were all very competitive and very good competition for each other.

“Kasper was a confident lad; he has always been confident. He was a chip off his dad’s block in that respect. He didn’t quite have the stature in those days he has now. He has matured physically. As a youngster, he probably suffered because he wasn’t the tallest and was a little suspect on crosses but since then, he has filled out and developed that physical side of his game immensely.

“He had the ability to be a good shot-stopper but as his career has progressed and he has moved on, as he matured, his positional sense has improved and he has become an outstanding goalkeeper.

“He has always been dedicated. He loved to go in goal and stop shots. He has had a tremendous hunger to be a goalkeeper.”

Schmeichel certainly didn’t have it easy because of his surname as he came through at Manchester City and his goalkeeping education took him to the less glamorous surrounds as he sought first-team experience. However, he couldn’t break through into the first team at the Etihad and made just 10 senior appearances before joining Eriksson again, at Notts County and then Leicester, where Fazackerley noticed a big change in the young protege.

“Sven had him three times, so he always had tremendous faith in him,” adds Fazackerley. “It is a testimony to Kasper that he was able to go away to a club like Notts County to get first-team football, which helped him improve and gave him the experience he needed to slowly work his way up the ladder. Then, we signed him at Leicester from Leeds United and he has gone from strength to strength, culminating in the title win (in 2015-16).

Kasper with his family including his dad Peter, back right, and the Premier League trophy at the King Power Stadium in May 2016 (Photo: Plumb Images/Leicester City FC via Getty Images)

“There were physical changes, a greater stature. He was always very quick, he read situations well and came out and was on top of people very quickly. You often see him today very difficult to beat one on ones, and he always was. But he became stronger as he got older and improved his ability.”

It certainly would have been a steep learning curve as one of the high-profile signings made by Eriksson when he became director of football at Notts County amid the attempted takeover by an unknown consortium that claimed to have the backing of Middle Eastern investors.

Eriksson walked away in the February of that season when it became apparent all was not as it seemed behind the scenes, but Schmeichel stayed and played 47 times as they won the League Two title.

“Fair play to his character because he was probably promised the earth at the time when he came to us and it didn’t materialise, when everyone thought there was money,” former Notts County central defender Mike Edwards tells The Athletic. “But he stayed until the end of the season to finish what he started. One thing we had was that we were a team, and he probably learned something from the experience. We couldn’t do it as individuals – we had to do it as a team.

“He was quite a raw player but he was an unbelievable shot-stopper. Coming down from those higher leagues, he probably didn’t know what to expect. He might have been disappointed but actually, we were quite a good team. I think, for us, it was a massive boost to have him playing behind us because it was one of those situations, playing as a centre-back in front of him, where I knew if I made a mistake, there was a good chance he would save it and get me out of it.

“It was a good team for him to come and learn in and play with. It was something we needed, someone at the back to help out.”

Bizarrely, one of the keepers Schmeichel was competing with for the No 1 jersey was Kevin Pilkington, who had been understudy to his father Peter at Manchester United, and Edwards recalls that Pilkington took the youngster under his wing.

Pilkington, Schmeichel, Russell Hoult and goalkeeping coach Carl Muggleton with the League Two trophy (Photo: Mike Egerton – PA Images via Getty Images)

“Sometimes, I would car-share with him and Pilks and all they would do would talk about this keeper doing this and that keeper does that through videos,” Edwards remembers. “It would seriously bore the hell out of me. Goalkeeper talk – they’re a different breed. I don’t know if Pilks started all that.

“When he was young, Kasper would join in with Pilks when he would be at the Manchester United training ground. He knew him from when Kasper was a very young age.

“It was a small coincidence that it was Pilks who was his rival for the No 1 jersey but he used to take him for a lot of coaching sessions, and he had been the understudy to his dad at United. Competition-wise, Kasper had to perform at Notts County because Kevin was a very good keeper.”

Despite his tender years and lack of experience, Edwards remembers an extremely vocal and quite demanding young keeper behind him but says that was exactly what their side needed.

“Show me a goalkeeper that isn’t vocal,” he says. “You have to be as a goalie. You have to be able to communicate. I can understand that, after coming down when he was used to playing with top-rated players who were consistently doing it all the time, and that was the big difference. You could tell he was always going to go on and do better.

“I nearly saw him score one of the best goals ever at Morecambe. He came up for a corner because we were losing 2-1 in the last minute and this cross came in and he just flew from the edge of the box. I have never seen anyone get their legs so high, and he nearly scissor-kicked the ball in. It went just over. It would have been one of the best goals ever.”

Schmeichel’s dedication and desire could often rub team-mates up the wrong way when their performances didn’t meet his own standards, and Fazackerley remembers how his outspoken nature had to be curtailed at times.

“He sets high standards and at times, he could be a little volatile, to the point where he could be quite damning of other players because he wanted perfection,” Fazackerley says. “Sometimes you had to control him a little bit, because you like players to have an opinion but it has to be delivered in a way that is conducive to improving the team. As he has matured, he has been able to control that better.

“He always gave his opinion and sometimes that had to be tempered a little because he was so demanding. He could, at times, upset people but, probably as he has matured mentally and physically, he has had to become a little calmer but he still has that tremendous drive and hunger that all top players have to win.”

Schmeichel remains the same demanding character after nine seasons with Leicester but he is a highly-respected member of a strong dressing room and one of the leaders in Rodgers’ squad.

“Kasper is a guy who expects the highest of high standards,” his team-mate Marc Albrighton tells The Athletic. “That is one of the best attributes you can have because he demands the highest from everyone. I respect him so much for that. He doesn’t allow anyone to let up. If he sees someone not pulling their weight, he will tell them but he can be nice with it as well.

“He is massive in the dressing room. He is respected throughout the club, rightly so. He brings a presence to the squad that you need from a keeper and one of your senior players. With Wes (Morgan) sitting out a lot of this season, he has stepped into the captaincy role really well. He is a pleasure to work with.”

“He has been here donkey’s years, longer than anyone,” says club captain Wes Morgan. “He’s part of the furniture and very well-respected. He is a big voice in the changing rooms and he is a great keeper. He has been great as a vice-captain to help me. When we have had to go to sort something and go to the office for the boys, we always have each other’s back and have been on the same page, so it has been great.”

The story has almost gone full circle because it is another Danish goalkeeper, 22-year-old Daniel Iversen, who is now learning from Schmeichel at Leicester and one big tip Iversen has picked up is “do your homework”.

“He watches so much football on YouTube, studying the keepers, and he tries to take something into training to work on so he can learn from them,” Iversen, currently on loan at Rotherham United, tells The Athletic. “I do that now too.

“He has taught me so many things on and off the pitch. If he offers me advice, I listen because he is so good to learn from. I have never seen anyone train as hard as he does. I was surprised because he’s not young any more but he’s still working so hard. He has taught me to work hard every day. I didn’t work as hard in training until I came to Leicester.

“I have learned from Kasper how hard you have to work to be a Premier League goalkeeper.”

(Photo: Clive Brunskill/Getty Images)

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