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Ah, the Backheel Overhead Goal

March 15th, 2014 · No Comments · Football, soccer

Here is one we don’t see every weekend.

Soccer’s backheel overhead goal.

And this one is particularly remarkable even by the rarefied standards of that exotic genre of goals.

The man scoring the goal is Motaz Salhani, a striker from war-torn Syria, whose first goal for the Jordan side Al Wehdat will be difficult to beat, no matter how long he stays with the club.

As you can see on the YouTube clip … a Wehdat player just one stride into the attacking end sends a fairly heavy pass 20 yards ahead, to Salhani, who is sprinting with a defender on his left shoulder.

Typically, a player in that position would stop, turn, trap the incoming ball and perhaps look to roll it toward a teammate steaming past.

Instead, Salhani goes for the miracle shot.

As the ball approaches (and the video is a little fuzzy, even the replays), he brings his right foot up a bit higher than normal, while he is landing on his left foot, and with the heel of his right foot, which is behind him, he gets the ball squarely, at least 30 yards from the goal …

And the ball floats about 20 feet high … past the goalkeeper, who is coming out to contest the breakaway … and lands one foot inside the goal.

You may not see one like it for a very long time.

And it’s probably fair to say Salhani couldn’t replicate that goal on a field without a single opponent on it … not in 100 tries.

Final score: Wehdat 1, Al Ramtha 0. Yes, that was the only goal.

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