Unsurprisingly, he never got on the pitch at the tournament.
So, while the statistics show that using all three goalkeepers in one tournament is an incredibly rare occurrence, including the four teams mentioned above, has a team ever used every member of their 23-man squad at the same finals? The answer is no.
Eight squads, including third-placed Germany in both 2006 and 2010, have used a record 22 players in a World Cup finals campaign. The only German player who did not play in those tournaments was their third goalkeeper. Would they have gone further if a fresh attacker could have been called upon in the respective semi-final losses to Italy and Spain?
Four years ago in South Africa the 32 teams used a total of 36 goalkeepers. Out of the 2,477 substitutions that have been made in the 772 matches at the World Cup finals, only 11 times has it been for one goalkeeper to replace another.
