News from the bet365 Stadium as Stoke City sign Viktor Johansson from Rotherham United as their first signing of the summer. Steven Schumacher and his ‘keeper coach, Darren Behcet, have been tracking Johansson since they arrived at Stoke City, and they are determined to make him their new number one.
Johansson, 25, has become Stoke’s first signing of the summer transfer window under head coach Schumacher, as the club removes its long-standing reliance on loan deals in goal. Stoke used a relegation release clause of almost £1 million to sign him from Rotherham United, where he had established himself as one of the Championship’s top keepers, as both parties agreed it was the appropriate move this summer.
Johansson, who has since been called up by Sweden for friendlies in June, had his pick of clubs in the division, whereas Stoke had a limited number of possibilities, including Daniel Iversen, who had played a key role in keeping the club up while on loan from Leicester. “I’m quite pleased. “It’s someone we kept an eye on throughout the second half of the season,” Schumacher told the Sentinel today in an extensive postseason interview.
“We discussed Viktor in January when we first arrived, but he was at Rotherham, who were still trying to survive and stay in the Championship.” We knew what his contract status was and what his buyout clause would be.
be come the end of the season. “So he was a goalkeeper we watched extensively and Darren Behcet was always on to me with reports for him. Even though Rotherham were struggling at the bottom of the division, he was one of their stand out performers. It gave us a lot of time to make sure we were making the right decision.
“There were other goalkeepers that we considered, Daniel Iversen being one of them. He was brilliant for us in the run-in, by the way, excellent. I spoke to Daniel at the end of the season and his circumstances were always going to be difficult because we didn’t know if Leicester were going to go up. Now they have and Daniel’s contract situation has changed and it was going to be another conversation for us that might have dragged on.
“But we made our mind up. Once the season had ended and we did our recruitment, we talked about which direction we were going to go in and we decided let’s go for Viktor Johansson, having watched him through the second half of the season.
“I spoke to him on the phone and had a good catch up with him, explained how I want to play, explained the vision for the club, where we want to get to, and he was desperate to get on board.
“He had other interest as well but coming here to be number one and play for such a huge club who is going to have ambitions to compete at the top end of the division next year, he wants to be a part of that.
“I’m overjoyed to have it completed, especially so early. It’s the first and most crucial aspect of the team, so credit goes to everyone involved for getting it done early.”
Stoke City’s revolving number one since 2019.
2019/20: Jack Butland (35 league starts), Adam Federici (7), and Adam Davies (4)
2020/21: Adam Davies (17), Joe Bursik (15), and Angus Gunn (14) 2021-22: Joe Bursik (19), Jack Bonham (15), Adam Davies (12)
2022/23: Jack Bonham (22), Joe Bursik (16), and Matija Sarkic (8)
2023/24: Daniel Iversen (18), Jack Bonham (14), Mark Travers (13) and Tommy Simkin (1).
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