Manuel Neuer’s season stats cement his status as the ultimate sweeper keeper

Manuel Neuer - goalkeeper, bud-nipper, midfield maestro.

Everyone knows that the Bayern Munich stopper loves nothing more than getting involved and sometimes that does involve heading the ball away from outside his area or dribbling the ball into midfield or, at some mental times, taking bloody throw-ins. We can all remember our favourite Neuer moment but the stats revealed on Bayern's official Facebook page this morning show how very fond the German is of playing sweeper. Neuer took a ludicrous 377 touches outside his area throughout the Bundesliga season which means, on average, he takes the ball outside the box over 11 times a game. He's also covered a whopping 154.9 km over the season which has to be a world record for a goalkeeper with the obvious exception of those crazy teams who allow their 'keeper take direct free kicks. Still, consider us impressed.