The West Ham United goalkeeper had a shocking few months.
Manuel Pellegrini has intimated that Roberto inadvertently contributed to his sacking by West Ham United.
The Irons parted company with the former Manchester City manager on December 18 following a defeat by Leicester City.
That was West Ham’s fourth successive Premier League loss and the Hammers might’ve paid the penalty for not having a steady back-up option for Lukasz Fabianski.
The Pole has missed most of this season with injury but his replacement, Roberto, proved nothing short of a disaster.
In just eight Premier League games, the Spanish goalkeeper made two errors which led to Pellegrini’s side conceding, not including an own goal or other calamitous mistakes which didn’t end up in the back of the net.
The Chilean eventually replaced him with David Martin, who started the season as West Ham’s third-choice keeper.
And Pellegrini, a Premier League champion in 2014, believes that Roberto – who has since been loaned to Alaves by David Moyes – may have been partially responsible for the downturn in results which cost him his job.
He told Chilean newspaper La Tercera: “Unfortunately, we had a major injury, from the goalkeeper of four months. And the performance of the second [Roberto] was not as expected.
“He had responsibility in several goals. The team was losing confidence, the results were denied and the owners decided to change.”
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