In Mal Peet's 2003 phantasmagoric coming-of-age novel, Keeper, two days after winning the World Cup, 'the greatest goalkeeper in the history of the world', El Gato - the Cat - tells a journalist the story of how he, as a 15-yr-old boy, was taught his trade by a mysterious figure on a football pitch in the depths of a South American forest where his father worked as a logger.In one of Gato's gruelling, Shaolin-like training sessions, 'the Keeper' tells him that the unexpected is the only thing a goalkeeper can depend on. 'Like the forest, you will come up against teams who can think of only one thing: how to cut you down. Or how to get past you, around you, through you. And all you have to do is stop them... You have something to defend, to protect. It is only a football goal, of course: three pieces of wood and a net. But this is more than most people have. And if you can protect that, then perhaps other things, more important things, can also be protected.'Over the last week or so, we have seen astounding displays of such monomaniacal protective force. Cabo Verde's custodian Vozinha's 7 saves against Spain in their opening game - 6 of which were shots fired from inside the box - have already made him a legend.Iran's Alireza Beiranvand defied both laws of orthopaedics and physics in the encounter with Belgium on Sunday when, in the 60th min, Kevin De Bruyne delivered a cutback pass that ricocheted off an Iranian defender straight to Maxim De Cuyper. Alireza was still sprawled after trying to cut off De Bruyne's pass, when, twisting on the ground, he somehow (how?!) managed to tip De Cuyper's point-blank shot away with a left hand outlandishly outstretched in a manner you can only find in those elongated figures painted by El Greco.On the very same day, Curacao's Eloy Room made a staggering, record-making 15 saves against Ecuador. This was not just about being in the right place at the right time to stop a projectile. Room decidedly channelled his inner Gandalf at his very own Bridge of Khazad-dum, stopping all Ecuador surges with, 'You cannot pass!'It wouldn't be an Alirezian stretch to consider that all three custodians who have already made this World Cup such a feast of blessed saviours have been forged in a process that's the reverse of what Peet's Keeper tells the young Gato: Vozinha, Alireza and Room may have gained their powers by years of protecting 'more important things' than goals.All three footballers play for countries that make the tag 'underdogs' seem downright leonine. The 40-yr-old Vozinha didn't even turn professional until he was 25, playing for lower-tier leagues and clubs in Angola, Moldova, Cyprus, Slovakia, and second-division Portuguese side Chaves. The fact that after the epic opener with Spain, he was in tears because he couldn't afford to pay for his mother's visa into the US in time is already a tournament meme-ory.And if playing a World Cup match against the 10th-ranked footballing side, in a country that is at war with yours - having bombed a school that killed at least 175 countrymen, most of them children, 113 days before kick-off - isn't pressure, then one doesn't know what pressure is. So, perhaps it shouldn't be that much of a surprise that the 33-yr-old Alireza fought to keep the most targeted object on a football pitch safe with almost deranged courage.37-yr-old Room has played top-tier Dutch football. But during his - and Curacao's - World Cup journey, the goalie also had to move from pillar to goalpost clubless, until he joined second-division Miami FC last December.In the society of football, the goalkeeper is an outlier, the anomalous player whose very job is to use his hands. This makes custodians not just the last line of defence with whom the buck literally stops, but also easy to be seen as footnotes if things go one's way - unless he saves penalty kicks, of course - and as fall guys if things go the other. (Alegria keeper Luca Zidane's was not the only defence sloppiness on display in their 0-3 drubbing by a Messi-anic Argentina. And, yet, it was Zinedine's 'anodyne' son who was marked out by the meme-sahebs.)What we have seen so far in this World Cup is the spotlight on goalkeeping ESP and muscle memory, adulation usually reserved for standout midfielders and strikers. But with 48 countries playing this year, the gap between minnows and veterans has been wonderfully unpredictable, with no small part played by nitty, gritty goalkeepers.As the Keeper tells young Gato: 'A right-footed player may fake a shot, but if he lifts his right arm up and back, he will then shoot. These things can be learnt. But an instinct for them is a gift... There is no time for your head to send messages to the rest of your body and for your body to turn these messages into actions. It must be automatic. It must be instinct.' What we have seen, consistently in some, over the last two-odd weeks, is this special instinct.indrajit.hazra@timesofindia.com