Tiago Volpi says he wants to be known as a goalkeeper, not a goalscorer, but that’s increasingly going to be a challenge if he stays near the top of the Liga MX scoring charts.
Volpi scored from the penalty spot in Toluca’s 3-2 win over Pachuca on Saturday, taking him up to five goals in the Clausura campaign — all of which have come from the penalty spot.
With four games remaining in the regular season, Volpi is only two goals off the league lead. It’s unlikely that the Brazilian will actually finish atop the league’s scoring charts, but it’s also not impossible.
⚽️🗣️¡Así lo gritamos en el Hidalgo!
Gooool de @TiagoVolpi 🫶🏻#NuestroViaje pic.twitter.com/xkqbz5sOfq
— Toluca FC (@TolucaFC) March 31, 2024
Volpi has scored all 14 penalties he has taken with Toluca since he arrived in 2022. In an interview on TUDN, the goalkeeper said that he’s become much more comfortable taking spot kicks with the Red Devils after having some practice with previous clubs.
“It is something new in my career. I had already had the opportunity to take penalties in Querétaro and Sao Paulo, but not as frequently as in Toluca,” Volpi said. “This is a plus and it’s not that I don’t want to be recognized for that, but I want to be recognized for what I do in the goal and not for the goals.
“I don’t enter the field thinking that I want to score and be a scoring champion. I see a lot of people talking about that because I’m two goals behind the leading scorer, but it’s a plus that was given to me in the last two years. It makes me happy, but it is not my main objective.”
Though his job is still primarily keeping balls out of the net rather than kicking them in, Volpi said he still devoted plenty of time at training to the latter.
“Yes [I practice penalties a lot],” he said. “I take over 50 penalties per week. It is different, the adrenaline and responsibility changes everything. It is better to prepare, but the pressure is totally different in a game than in training.”
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