Did we just see the Puskás Award goal scored? It is only February, but this goal will surely be a finalist come 2017 when the awards are handed out. Faiz Subri of Penang FA knuckle balled a free kick from 35 yards out and it truly defied physics. See for yourself.
West Ham United was off to a hot start to the 2015/16 Premier League season. They rallied off a 6-3-3 record with the help of Dimitri Payet, who scored 5 goals and tacked on 3 assists. Things were going well for The Hammers, and then Payet went down with an ankle injury and West Ham went on to only win two of their next 9 games, with 5 of those matches resulting in ties. Getting points is always good, but the loss of Payet was affecting the squad in the win column.
It takes a truly talented player to score a free kick at any point in a match, but to score one when the stakes are as high as a league title, well, that takes something legendary.
Back in 2007, Celtic were tied with Killmarnock 1-1 going into the closing stages of the game. Only a win would allow them to celebrate a championship, and arguably the game’s last real goal-scoring chance fell to Shunsuke Nakamura when Celtic won a free kick outside of Killmarnock’s box.
Sometimes we see freak cases where goalkeepers score goals, whether it be from a kick within the box that ends up in the opposite net or a last minute set piece. Rarely do you see a goalkeeper taking a free kick or a penalty kick. Even rarer do you see a keeper with over 100 goals. Because there’s only one. The man, the myth, the legend, Rogerio Ceni.
Defending a penalty kick in soccer is one of the hardest things to do in all of sports. That is not my opinion, that is a fact that is proven by a plethora of statistics including shot conversion rates, how much ground a goalkeeper has to cover, and the fraction of time they have in order to cover that ground.
Some say that stopping a penalty in soccer is the hardest thing to do in sports. There is no real penalty saving trick. The net is so large, the ball so small, and the shot is coming from such a close range that keepers must guess which way they are going to dive before the ball is hit to have a chance at saving it. Even if they dive in the correct direction it is unlikely they’ll be able to stop it. If they’re unlucky and dive the wrong direction, well, let’s just say that every keeper in the world has been left on the proverbial other side of the coin.
Cristiano Ronaldo scored a senstational free kick goal today against Malmo in the Champions League. It was only his 3rd free kick goal in his last 99 attempts and his first in his last 20. But the Portuguesse star has now scored 70 goals in 69 gams for Real Madrid. It was Ronaldo's first direct FK goal in the Champions League since April of 2014. Ronaldo finished the match with 4 goals coming in a span of 20 minutes. He has set the record for most goals scored (11) in the a Champions League group stage. Here is another angle of the first goal:
Is there anything more dramatic in the sport of soccer than a direct free kick? The referee marching off the ten yards, exuberantly laying down the vanishing spray while the entire stadium holds its collective breath, anticipating the immaculate strike. Step forward the dead ball specialist.
But who is the best in the world? Who, after going through the melodrama of scrutinizing the stationary ball and plastering their facial features with the look of ingrained concentration, actually sticks the ball in the back of the net with some regularity?
Ask any soccer fan, and they will know about the Robeto Carlos free kick goal. It is considered by many as the best free kick ever taken, and has even gained haters along the way who contest that Carlos didn't mean to do it. We say that's some b.s, and think Carlos knew exactly what he was doing before he executed the most cold blooded free kick ever.
This Christen Eriksen goal for Tottenham is what Spurs fans were expecting from the Denmark international this season. The lad has had a slow start in the Premier League, but his two goal performance this weekend may be a sign for what's to come from the 23-year-old. Sitting in the middle of the tabe and coming off a 4-1 shalacking of first place Chelsea, Tottenham looked to steal three points from a solid Swansea team who hasn't won since their 2-1 victory over Manchester United back in August.