The unpredictable nature of football is often pinpointed as one of the primary reasons behind its worldwide appeal and popularity.
One reason for its unpredictability is that the skill-set required for playing the game at a high level is so varied, meaning players must showcase a variety of different talents whenever they step out onto the pitch.
There are those, though, who just love performing a particular skill time and time again, to such an extent that it’s become widely known as their signature move.
Somehow these one-trick ponies (or to put it more accurately, the masters of their art) manage to pull off their skill of choice with alarming ease to humiliate and bamboozle opponents. Even if the defending players know what’s coming, they simply can’t stop it.
Just think of the late, great Johan Cruyff’s game-changing and career-defining special move ‘The Cruyff Turn’, or more recently Zinedine Zidane’s perfectly executed pirouette that saw him balletically spin away from oncoming challenges.
Those two stars, along with countless others, defined the era in which they played due to their repertoire of tricks and flicks, but which current players are doing likewise?
Here’s Squawka’s list of 10 top-class players and their trademark moves.
1. Arjen Robben (Bayern Munich and Holland)
Trademark move: Cut inside. Shoot. Score. Repeat
You know the drill.
Robben picks the ball up on the right wing, jinks away from his opposing full-back infield before releasing a powerful shot on goal with his favoured left foot, often to devastating effect.
It’s a simple trick, but Robben, who has 246 career goals for club and country to his name, has managed to score using it for years, regardless of which team he’s played for and which country he’s played in.
2. Neymar (Paris Saint-Germain and Brazil)
Trademark move: The backheel control
TOUCH! Neymar brings the ball down in style pic.twitter.com/dvhMfAOeR0
— ITV Football (@itvfootball) June 27, 2018
Arguably the most entertaining player currently in world football, Neymar’s playbook is extensive, so narrowing down his repertoire of skills to just one is a tricky task.
However, one trick that’s been seen with increasing regularity has been his backheel control – a move that perfectly sums up the £200m Paris Saint-Germain signing’s flair and exuberance.
Whenever a central midfielder switches the ball out to Neymar’s left flank, everyone waits with baited breath to see him pull the ball out of the sky with the heel of his wrong foot. Somehow he always manages to trap it perfectly.
3. Cristiano Ronaldo (Juventus and Portugal)
Trademark move: The Ronaldo chop
Ronaldo has adapted his game in recent years as he approaches the twilight years of his career, meaning it’s becoming increasingly uncommon to witness the Portuguese running down the wing at full-tilt.
Back in the days before he was primarily just a goal-machine, Ronaldo was one of the flashiest players around, winding up opponents at will with his stepovers and extravagant body feints.
Ronaldo’s most effective move though was the ‘chop’, which saw him leap over the ball with his dribbling foot before chopping it back towards the other side to change direction. Players across the world have tried (and largely failed) to replicate it ever since he started doing it in the early noughties.
Lionel Messi (Barcelona and Argentina)
Trademark move: The one-on-one dink
Similarly to his old adversary Ronaldo, Messi has scored a frankly obscene number of goals during his career so far, ranging from breathtaking free-kicks, curled efforts from the edge of the box and the odd tap-in.
One particular finish that football fans have seen on numerous occasions down the years though has been the lob, which he’s executed in different ways and with either foot.
There’s virtually nothing he can’t do with the ball when rushing through on goal. He can scoop it, dink it and lob it when the ball is off the ground, causing untold pain to opposing keepers. You’ve got to feel for them.
Philippe Coutinho (Barcelona and Brazil)
Trademark move: the shimmy and shoot… from outside the area
He’s done it three times already this season (if you count the one in pre-season against Leicester). What used to be a source of irritation among Liverpool fans bemoaning potshots from range has now morphed into a veritable red flag for opposing Premier League goalies: Coutinho, 20-ish yards out, carries the ball across the face of goal, nudges it on with (usually) the outside of his right boot to give himself the angle, then unleashes a curling effort.
And it works. Since arriving in England, Coutinho pulled off a number of speculative curling strikes from outside the box, and he took that form with him to Barcelona, as the pint-sized magician netted four stunning long-range efforts in La Liga last season.
Ricardo Quaresma (Besiktas and Portugal)
Trademark move: The trivela
An outrageously gifted attacker who hasn’t quite hit the heights expected of him during his career, Quaresma has nevertheless provided plenty of magical moments in his time.
The Euro 2016 winner has made the ‘Trivela’ his go-to move, effectively using the outside of his favoured right foot to shoot and cross with unnerving pace, accuracy and power.
If you haven’t seen his Trivela assist to Cristiano Ronaldo against Estonia, Google it immediately.
If you haven’t seen his Trivela goal against Iran at the 2018 World Cup, Google it immediately.
HIS FOOT IS POINTING THE WRONG WAY! 🤯 pic.twitter.com/josW4xWH5c
— Squawka News (@SquawkaNews) June 25, 2018
Angel Di Maria (Paris Saint-Germain and Argentina)
Trademark move: The rabona cross
A bit like Quaresma, Di Maria’s trademark move – the rabona cross – has presumably been developed, in part, due to his reluctance to use his weaker foot, but when he pulls it off successfully it looks absolutely majestic.
If the Argentine finds himself marauding down the right wing, his natural inclination is to dip inside onto his left foot, but to avoid becoming easy to defend against, he’s also perfected the art of crossing the ball with his left-foot tucked behind his right.
His most memorable execution of the rabona cross was when he assisted Cristiano Ronaldo while playing for Real Madrid in the Champions League against FC Copenhagen.
Sergio Busquets (Barcelona and Spain)
Trademark move: The “made you look” drag back
Everyone’s favourite wind-up merchant is a criminally underrated member of the Barcelona and Spain team due to the unfussy manner in which he goes about his business.
Watch Busquets carefully, however, and you’ll notice he has much more to his game than immediately meets the eye. In fact, he’s basically trademarked his own skill move that’s perfect for his deep-lying central midfield position.
When closed down by opponents, Busquets frequently finds that extra-yard of space by dragging the ball away from them, before pushing it into space from which he can initiate another attack. All it needs now is an actual name…
Adam Lallana (Liverpool and England)
Trademark move: The Cruyff turn
OK, obviously this isn’t strictly his move, but how could we avoid putting Lallana on the list? Whereas Cruyff used his turn to dance away from full-backs, Lallana loves twisting and turning anywhere on the pitch.
Fortunately, Lallana is very adept at it, swivelling around opponents with either foot, and where once it was a stick with which his critics used to beat him, it’s now seen as a strength and sign of his intelligence given his excellent performances in the 2016/17 season.
Andres Iniesta (Vissel Kobe and Spain)
Trademark move: La Croqueta
Another one of La Masia’s world-class graduates makes this list in the form of Andres Iniesta.
Iniesta is perhaps the kind of player who will only truly be appreciated once he’s retired, as he doesn’t tend to score or assist many goals despite operating high-up the pitch – already the love has poured in since his move to Japan.
Instead, he’s a wonderfully skilled craftsman who glides his way effortlessly around the pitch, often using ‘La Croqueta’ to deceive opponents – moving the ball sharply from one foot to the other to create space for himself.
Always a class act
@andresiniesta8's first goal with Vissel Kobe
@vissel_kobepic.twitter.com/eSBbpXGnwX
— FC Barcelona (@FCBarcelona) August 11, 2018
The post 10 top-class players and the trademark moves they do over, and over, and over again appeared first on Squawka News.
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