Does Black Spider take the Skill out of Goalkeeping?

Comment from TheGloveBag.com: (The webbed Black Spider gloves) would take the skill out of goalkeeping.... Sounds strange but i dont want goalkeeping to be easy, i want to hold shots because thats what i work on in training and because i'm that good, not because i've got some massive glove that does half the work for me.

The Black Spider gloves won't quicken a player's reaction time in getting his hands in front of the ball, his sense of positioning, or his strength when challenging for a ball or leaping for it as needed, all of which is a very large part of the position. After all, what good is having “good hands” if your positioning is all wrong, you are slow to move toward the shot, you don’t get your hands in shape in time to meet the ball, or you are easily knocked away from the ball (or afraid to challenge for it in the first place). The notion that these gloves will make goalkeeping easy gives them much more credit than we claim or deserve.

The same argument was used against oxygen for mountain climbers, face masks for hockey goalkeepers, metal and then fibreglass skis for ski racers, and better/safer car design for race car drivers. These engineering improvements make the sports safer and usually more challenging, oftentimes allowing us to do things as sportsman we couldn’t do otherwise.

The webbed glove started out to increase protection of the fingers. It was only after we got some prototypes made that we discovered how much it increased the ability to hold onto the ball, strength when parrying/ deflecting, and distance and accuracy when throwing.

I still think the issue of safety is important, and not just to prevent back-bending injuries to the fingers. Especially for those balls that hit the keeper’s hands and then fall loose in the goal area, it is instinctive for the keeper to lunge for such loose balls, yet the ball is then fair game for the strikers as well. These are very dangerous moments, as we have all seen.

I am struck by how many balls hit the keepers hands and rebound into the goal area, even at highest level play. One night I kept count while watching an EPL highlight show, and fully 1/3 of the shots hitting the keepers hands were not held. That is a lot. I don’t expect these gloves will mean that every ball is held. The shape of the hands at impact is very important, and some shots just come in too fast to properly react.
Beginning keepers will get the greatest obvious advantages out of this glove design, but even the most experienced keepers will get some benefit in the areas mentioned above. At the highest levels of any sport, it is split-seconds and millimeters that make the difference, so even slight advantages for a well-trained keeper will be important.