The black and white footage on ESPN dated back almost four decades, but the festering pain formed a timeline from the terrace to the sofa. “I still can’t believe I didn’t get my body behind the ball,” Gary Sprake said of the repeat showing of his error from the 1970 FA Cup Final between Leeds United and Chelsea. “I’m still deeply embarrassed.”

It is why the man labelled Careless Hands fears for Scott Carson. Liverpool want to make him Britain’s most expensive goalkeeper but his value may have dipped well under their £10 million asking price after his calamitous debut for England against Croatia on Wednesday. The question is: can he put it out of his mind and deal with being a sop for public rancour?

“It’s the abuse that you take from away fans that gets to you,” Sprake, a hugely gifted goalkeeper for Leeds United but one defined by his gaffes, said. “They’ll come up with a name for him and it’s going to take him a long time. Personally, I’d have had David James in goal, but he has had to put up with the ‘Calamity’ tag. People remember the bad and never forget.”

Carson is clearly talented, but Martin O’Neill, his manager at Aston Villa, admitted that the mind of the goalkeeper is complex. “I couldn’t tell you if he was chosen for England in a really important game how he would react at all,” he said before the nadir at Wembley.

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BACKGROUND

• O’Neill rules himself out of running

• Same old routine for Barwick and Co

• £2.5m for worst English manager

• English game paralysed by fear of the unknown

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• Defeat puts paid to hopes of £2bn bonanza

• McClaren's epitaph: ‘Worse than Graham Taylor’

• Former coach faces fight to rebuild reputation

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• From 1 to 11: why number was up for England

• Beckham is the blueprint by which to rebuild national game

• Talisman expects backlash but is not retiring

• Carson hoping to bounce back

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• Wembley authorities unable to explain quagmire

• England were a shower but I’d do it all again

• Time to support the other red and whites

• England got what they deserved, says Corluka

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Young, gifted and on the back burner, there are sad precedents for Carson. In 2000, Ipswich Town’s rising star, Richard Wright, made his England debut in Malta also aged 22. He gave away two penalties and scored an own goal in a scrappy 2-1 win and tried to consign that hellish debut to history. He looked like he might do that when he moved to Arsenal for £6 million to rival an ageing and inconsistent David Seaman, but he never established himself, slipped to third in the pecking order behind Stuart Taylor and has not started another England match. Now, at 30, he should be at his peak but instead is the second choice at West Ham United.

Carson’s career is yet to take off since he moved to Liverpool for £750,000 in 2005. He made a high-profile mistake when he let a tame header by Fabio Cannavaro, of Juventus, slip through his hands on his Champions League debut in the first leg of a quarter-final in 2005 and the erratic Jerzy Dudek was back for the return leg the next week. Carson played two more league games before being sent to Sheffield Wednesday on loan.

“He’s got to get it out of his system as soon as possible,” Steven Gerrard said as he emerged unscathed from the detritus of an abject night on Wednesday. Gerrard knows that his scuffed volley in the 2-1 defeat by Russia last month will be quickly forgotten by those lining up to taunt Carson.

David Beckham, who knows more than most about being made a scapegoat, made a telling comment when he said: “You get things thrown at you, but it’s how you react that counts.”

The enduring concern for England is that they have yet to find a reliable replacement for Seaman. The fledgelings – Chris Kirkland, Robert Green and Ben Foster – have been blighted by injury, while Paul Robinson is suffering a crisis of confidence for club and country. Who knows whether that can be traced back to the moment Gary Neville delivered the back-pass in Croatia 13 months ago that resulted in Robinson being lampooned? What is clear is that every England goalkeeper has to deal with it at some point. Robinson was elevated to No 1 status only because James made an error in a draw against Austria in 2004 and was morphed into a back-page donkey.

“What happened after the Austria game just made me stronger and even more determined to prove people wrong,” James said. Yet, despite those words and reviving his career at Portsmouth, James has not started a competitive international since.

Sprake also knows that time is a quack doctor at best. “I caught that mistake from 1970 on ESPN the other night and it made me cringe,” he said. “I think Carson is a good goalkeeper and hope he can deal with it, but the truth is I also think the standard of goalkeeping in England has dropped significantly.”

It will surely help that, England advances permitting, Carson may have O’Neill to dress his wounds. His man-management skills are legend and he relishes restoring the tainted reputations of men such as Stan Collymore. If that does not work, Carson can always look to history for his solace as there is always someone more unfortunate than yourself. It was 1878 when Conrad Warner was called up to face Scotland for the first time and promptly let in seven goals. The bad news from this tale is that he never played for England again.

Goalkeeping gaffes

Gary Sprake Liverpool v Leeds United, 1967 Sprake was about to throw the ball out to Terry Cooper, the Leeds full back, when he noticed Ian Callaghan running into the area. He stopped but inadvertently put the ball into his own net instead. Cue Careless Hands, a hit for Des O’Connor, from the wily Koppites.

Ray Clemence Scotland v England, 1976 In an era when the Home Internationals (surely to be revived now?) meant something, Kenny Dalglish scuffed a tame shot towards the England goalkeeper, who inexplicably let it slide through his legs. Scotland won 2-1.

David Seaman England v Brazil, 2002 Seaman was an ailing force by the time Ronaldinho scored with a free kick that was laughably hailed as a fluke by those unaware of his genius. Nevertheless, Seaman, who previously had been beaten by Nayim from the halfway line and later would let a Macedonia player score direct from a corner, was embarrassed.

Peter Enckelman Birmingham City v Aston Villa, 2002 The Finland goalkeeper cemented his place in Second City folklore during the first league derby for a decade. Olof Mellberg directed a throw-in to his goalkeeper, who let the ball run under his foot, brushing his boot, and roll into the net. Taunted by a Birmingham fan who ran on the pitch, Enckelman’s career stuttered to second-team status at Blackburn Rovers.