German goalkeeper Robert Enke’s death after being struck by a train is being investigated for suicide. He is reported to have left a “farewell note” and his widow speaks of his long spell of depression. He was, it turns out, concealing the extent of his depression from his family and the medical staff treating him, and the German Chancellor has expressed her “consternation” at this untimely death of a sportsperson.

In a curious way, Enke’s death spotlights the strange loneliness of the players in gloves in our team sports. (This is, of course, not to suggest in any way that his condition was connected to his role in the team.) Goal-keepers and wicket-keepers are akin to referees and umpires — you really notice them when they get it wrong. Else, for the longest stretches of action on the field they must sustain, uncheered, an extraordinary level of alertness not required of other players. In football, they provide the last line of defence, a role that gets peculiarly highlighted when an opponent breaks away, leaving defenders stranded elsewhere, and confronts a goalkeeper with a choice: whether to simply try to block the shot at goal or to surrender to a dubious tackle and with it the possibility of conceding a penalty.

Great teams are often constructed around great goal-keepers and wicket-keepers — and in a curious way they can block the road for other aspirants. For them it’s sometimes a struggle to just get a chance to prove their potential at the highest levels. For instance, Adam Gilchrist, among the most eloquent sportspersons today, moved to Western Australia because he couldn’t get a game in for New South Wales. But then he also gave a new twist to his role, when he said he famously walked — un-Australia-like — because from behind the stumps he too often saw opponents dig in their heels when they’d been clearly out.