Ross Turnbull goes bye-bye

You know, over the course of the past few years, I've come to believe that Ross Turnbull doesn't actually exist. At least, not as a real person. Instead, he seemed to be the perfect incarnation of the entire backup goalkeeper archetype -- content to sit on the bench and accumulate trophies without actually doing anything, competent enough to be a professional footballer but not nearly good enough for anyone to be comfortable with him actually playing and generally maligned by fans. Even his name sounds like it's been randomly generated.

So when I heard this:

Contrary to what's reported elsewhere, Chelsea haven't confirmed release of Ross Turnbull. But PFA have - so confirmation likely to follow.

— Dan Levene (@BluesChronicle) May 26, 2013

I didn't feel as though a real player was being let go. There are footballers and there are Ross Turnbulls, and unless Chelsea do something very silly like recall Thibaut Courtois to plop himself in those nice heated seats as a substitute, another indistinguishable backup goalkeeper will quickly appear to take the old one's place.

The Ross Turnbull is dead. Long live Ross Turnbull!