Pepe Reina

"Pepe"” Reina played 30 league games from 2000-2002 for Barcelona and was involved in both legs against Liverpool in the semi-finals of the UEFA Cup in the 2000/01 season. Liverpool proceeded to the final after Gary McAllister scored past the 18-year-old Reina from the penalty spot in the second leg at Anfield. After Louis Van Gaal returned to Barcelona for his second spell in charge it soon became clear that he didn’t have enough faith in Reina who joined Villarreal in the summer of 2002. Reina played 32 league games in his first season and didn’t miss a single La Liga game in his second and third season which proved to be his last. He was considered the best ‘keeper in La Liga in the 2004/05 season as Villarreal grabbed third place and a potential spot in the Champions League for the first time in the club’s history. Reina was noted for saving seven penalties out of the nine Villarreal conceded in the season.

The 22-year-old Reina was very experienced for his age with around 175 first-team games when he arrived at Liverpool in the summer of 2005. Rafa clearly saw him as his number one for the future and the determined Spaniard didn’t disappoint his compatriot. Reina enhanced his reputation as a penalty-stopper when he saved three penalties from West Ham in the shootout of the 2006 FA Cup final and ended his first season as a Cup hero. Reina didn’t make the best of starts in his second season, making a glaring error in the Merseyside derby on 9 September 2006 when Liverpool lost 3-0 at Goodison Park. The Spaniard kept his place in the starting line-up even though he was well below his best. Rafa’s faith in him paid off as Reina grew stronger as the season progressed and kept Jerzy Dudek out of the starting 11. In 2008, amazingly his third season in succession, Reina was the recipient of the “Golden Gloves” award for keeping the most ‘clean sheets’ in the Premier League. He achieved 50 ‘clean sheets’ in the fewest number of league matches, 92, beating the previous record held by Ray Clemence by three matches.

Reina joined club colleagues Alvaro Arbeloa, Fernando Torres and Xabi Alonso in the Spanish squad for the European Championships held in Austria and Switzerland. Real Madrid’s Iker Casillas had been impossible for Reina to dislodge from the No. 1 slot, but he proudly went up to collect a winners’ medal even though he had only played an active part in one of the group matches, against Greece. Reina’s celebrations, once the conquering heroes returned to Spain, will never be forgotten where his clownish side really came out in a big way. In the 2008/09 season Reina was again a vital part of the Liverpool team that had seemed likely to bring in the elusive Premier League title. In April 2010, it was revealed that the popular Spaniard had signed a six-year extension to his contract. One of the team’s most reliable performers during a turbulent 2009/10 season, Reina was again the ‘Golden Glove’ winner for most ‘clean sheets’ in the League, 17 in total, a distinction he shared with Chelsea’s Petr Cech. In the World Cup 2010, Reina was as before second-choice for his country behind Casillas and did not see a single minute of competitive action in any of Spain’s seven matches as they won the tournament for the first time. He was as ever heavily involved in the victory celebrations!

Reina played in all 38 Premier League matches for the fourth successive season in 2010/11 but was clearly way below his best form. He missed four Premier League matches in 2011/12 after he was sent off at Newcastle in April following an altercation with home defender James Perch. Pepe did, however, play in more domestic cup matches than in any previous season as a Liverpool player as the club reached the Wembley finals of both the League and FA Cup. Pepe’s performances in the Liverpool goal had been on a downward spiral until he was back to his best in early 2012/13. Brendan Rodgers was pleased with his progress: “He is the No.1 ‘keeper for Liverpool. Yes, he will admit it himself, he probably had a difficult couple of years but he now has a sense of his best years are in front of him, not behind him. He has lost weight, he looks fresh, he looks bright and he is doing extra work.” Reina missed seven of the thirty-eight Premier League matches in 2012/13 with Brad Jones playing in the matches Reina missed. Jones also started all four domestic cup-ties and four of the twelve Europa League fixtures. The Spaniard had a difficult 2011/12 season by his own high standards but redeemed himself in 2012/13 when he seemed to recover a lot of his lost confidence and assurance. He celebrated his 30th birthday soon after the season started and by the end of it had taken his number of first-team appearances for Liverpool to within half a dozen of the four hundred mark.

Just over a month after Liverpool signed Simon Mignolet from Sunderland in the summer of 2013, it was announced that the 30-year-old Reina would be joining Napoli for the whole of the 2013/14 season, a move that would see him reunited with the man who bought him for Liverpool in 2005, Rafa Benítez. Reina was bitter about his departure as he wrote on his personal website. "It is only natural that I would be disappointed that the Liverpool management agreed to loan me to Napoli without telling me first, I thought that I deserved better than that even though I understand that difficult decisions have to be taken in football. A lot has been made about me informing the club that if an offer came in from Barcelona that I would have liked them to consider it."

Reina's year in Naples was more success than failure. The goalkeeper had made 29 league appearances out of 37 as Napoli prepared for their final Serie A fixture of the season at home to Hellas Verona. Pepe was also between the posts when the southern club won the Coppa Italia by beating Fiorentina 3-1 in the final played at the Stadio Olimpico in Rome. But both the English and Italian seasons ended without Reina's immediate future having been resolved. In February, when Reina commented on his pending arrival at Liverpool in the summer, Rodgers made him realise there was no turning back. “[Reina] wrote a goodbye letter didn’t he? I was surprised a loan player wrote a letter," he told the press. "I would suspect that he should come back but obviously Pepe made it very clear when he went to Napoli that he was looking to move. He penned a great big letter saying he was going to work with the best manager that he’d worked with and thanked us for his time for Liverpool. So for me it probably sounded like he’d made his decision there.”

In the World Cup finals in Brazil 2014, Iker Casillas was unsurprisingly between the posts for Spain in the first two group matches against Holland and Chile. Two defeats meant that the defending champions would be going home early and Reina was named in goal for the final group match, a comfortable 3-0 victory over Australia in Curitiba. It was his 33rd appearance for the senior Spanish team. 

Reina was not used at all in Liverpool's pre-season trip in the USA despite training with the first team. He eventually signed a three-year contract with Bayern Munich in August 2014, ending his eight-year stay with Liverpool. "Pep [Guardiola] wanted a keeper like Manuel Neuer who’s capable of joining in the build-up play,” said Bayern's chairman, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge. "You can never take for granted finding a man with his experience and quality who's prepared to accept the number two position." Predictably Reina didn't get many chances to shine for Bayern in 2014/15, playing just three times in the Bundesliga and not at all in cup competitions. He then moved to Napoli in the summer of 2015 where he was their number one, playing in all bar one of their games in Serie A. After three years there, he joined AC Milan in 2018 to act as back up to Italian international Gianluigi Donnarumma. He played twice in Serie A in 2018-19 and six times in the Europa League. In September 2019, he managed to get red carded whilst on the bench against Torino for comments to the referee. In the one game he did play, he saved an injury time penalty against Genoa.

Reina returned to England when he was loaned to Aston Villa on 13 January 2020. His first appearance at Anfield since leaving however was behind closed doors due to the Covid 19 pandemic. At the expiry of his contract he remained in Serie A, joining Lazio. For a season and a half he was the first choice keeper there and in the summer of 2022 he agreed a one year deal with Villareal that would take him past his fortieth birthday. Reina ended up stating until 2024, making the 1000th competitive game of his career whilst there. He left in the summer of 2024 but confirmed this was not the end of his playing days, saying "Now I need to find the place that will help me write the last chapter, feeling very prepared and motivated to do so". He joined Como, newly promoted to Serie A, telling the club website that he would "give my contribution to the development of this club." He started twelve matches in Serie A, but had an agonising final game, being shown a straight red card shortly before half time for bringing down an Inter player outside the area. He was given a standing ovation by both sets of players as he left the pitch bringing his career to a close after more than 1,000 games.