Goal celebrations are a curiously performative affair. For a game which rides along waves and troughs of activity, the brief period immediately following a goal provides a curious time in a soccer match.
In our puritan soccer fan minds, we want to see celebrations as an unadulterated expression of a player’s joy at scoring a goal – a liminal space in which proceedings are suspended to celebrate and revel in what has just happened. When a player scores, we like to imagine them celebrating in their backyard as a kid or whatever scrappy youth team they played on. We like to think that same spontaneous childlike joy is merely translated to the professional game – the same joy, just with bigger muscles and sleeve tats.
In the case of Marco Tardelli’s goal in the 1982 World Cup final, it’s the image of Tardelli, clench-fisted, screaming and shaking his head in ecstasy as he sprints toward the Italian dugout that gains prominence in fans’ recollections over the actual goal (the result of a inelegant, stalled Italian counter-attack. Even Tardelli’s first touch is poor, though his recovering sliding shot is sweetly struck).
Often, though, there’s a creeping sense that their celebration has been fully practiced and rehearsed. Sometimes this is OK and funny. Goalscorers occasionally capitalize on their moment in the spotlight by using their celebration to react in some way to the media or public opinion surrounding the game. We can look to some classic mid-90s bantz for two examples of this:
Robbie Fowler famously responded to allegations that he used cocaine by pretending to do exactly that after dispatching a penalty for Liverpool, only to be subsequently suspended for four games by the FA – presumably because cocaine is bad and jokes are sometimes tricky for doddering old white men to figure out. Likewise, Paul Gascoigne’s goal against Scotland in Euro 1996 served as a riposte to coverage of the England team’s pre-tournament drinking exploits in the tabloid press. Though, in this case, such was the quality of the goal, it too has remained in the public’s mind along with the celebration that followed it.
Cristiano Ronaldo is a prime example of pre-meditated celebrations not being that great (or, at least, his pre-Saudi celebrations were. I have no interest in finding out how he celebrates goals now). I’d be willing to bet quite a bit of money that that dude has practiced his trademarked “Sui!!” celebration in front of quite a few luxury wall mirrors in his time. And, to be fair, as celebrations go, it’s not bad. The incorporated element of crowd participation – yelling “Sui!!” as Cristiano sticks the landing is fairly unique and probably quite fun to participate in as a fan at the stadium. But you only have to look back at some of Ronaldo’s pre-Sui celebrations to see some truly, horrific premeditated shit.
For example, his goal for Real Madrid to break the record for most goals in a single Champions League Campaign.
So clearly was this bizarre, self-congratulatory, hand-number thingy the product of a substantial amount of rehearsal and work-shopping that it soured the accomplishment1.
“Yes, Cristiano, you broke an astonishing record, but you definitely weren’t chill about it, sooo, does it really count?”
If a 15-year-old did this in a high school game, they’d get some kind of talking-to from the coach at half time and probably a few reducers from the opposing center back for their troubles. It’s not an unreasonable leap to think that Cristiano Ronaldo puts a significant amount of thought into how he celebrates his goals. And, ultimately, this is fine. Whatever. Cristiano is always going to Cristiano. Lots of goals, mediocre to poor celebrations.
Someone else who has scored a few goals in his time is Leo Messi. I love Leo Messi – we’re truly lucky to have been around to witness what he’s accomplished. But his goal celebrations leave a lot to be desired. And I get it this is part of his charm. The slightly humble vibe of a kid from a small town in Argentina just happy to be out there doing what he does best. Typically, Messi’s celebrations consist of running around a bit and hugging his teammates. There’s just not a lot for us to go on here. Just once I’d like to see Messi do something outlandish. Something so over the top and rehearsed that we forget for a moment that the greatest player of all time has just scored the eight thousandth goal of his career and instead pay attention to the aftermath of the goal.
Leo, on the off-chance this post appears in your RSS reader as your trawling through a Miami-area Publix sometime soon, here are a few ideas:
- Score a goal and pull a Phil Neville effigy out from the dugout – light it on fire in the technical area while the rest of your teammates gather round to watch it burn. Not only will this be surprising, it will also help exorcise the Phil Neville demons that are no doubt still hanging around the Inter Miami stadium.
- Score a goal and perform a fully choreographed dance with the rest of the team. American football teams do this all the time but soccer has been sadly lacking in this critical genre of celebrations.
- Score a goal and just walk off, forever. What are you doing in Miami anyway, really?
This leads us to the obvious conclusion that the best goal scorers aren’t necessarily the best goal celebrators.
I propose that the best goal-celebrator of his time, is none other than Thomas Müller. Hear me out.
There’s no complicated dance routine, no hand signals – at most, he’ll reach out a clenched fist and waves that about a bit. Sometimes he’ll run around a few yards depending on where he is on the field the moment the ball goes in. Most of the time, too, he’ll direct some kind of aggressive congratulatory vibes towards the assistor of the goal. All this is fairly unremarkable and unpolished.
But Thomas Müller is the best goal celebrator because of where he celebrates. More often than not, Müller will celebrate in the opposition penalty area. At this point, it’s probably worth taking a brief sojourn to discuss Thomas Müller, the player.
Thomas Müller is the awkward gangly, slightly uncoordinated kid whose combination of effort and an incidental knack for getting the ball in the back of the net has helped him be one of the best players in the world for almost 15 years. Despite lacking in what you might term “hand-eye coordination”, Müller is blessed with an off-the-charts soccer IQ for playing in the forward line.
His off-ball movement and his ability to find and exploit space (seriously, search “raumdeuter”, which roughly translates to “space interpreter”, in Google and see which spindly German athlete greets you at the top of the search results. I’ll wait.) mean that despite giving you the creeping sense that you’re watching a newborn deer trying to figure out how to both walk and kick a soccer ball at the same time, the result has always been goals.
So, back to Müller’s goal celebrations. Celebrating in the opposition penalty area is a function of where he scores the majority of his goals, obviously – newborn baby deer often have trouble going on mazy 40 yard runs through opposing defenses – but he’s also staking a claim.
Switching sports for a moment, the English cricket wicketkeeper2, Jack Russell (not his real name but the name he went by because banter) would often talk about owning the space opposing batters typically view as their own. In this case, he went out of his way, as often as he could, to invade that space. To jostle and harangue, all while going about the otherwise tedious task of getting the ball back to the bowler for the next delivery.
Müller is doing something similar here. By not running off to a corner flag to celebrate in front of his teams’ fans, by not seeking out his team’s fan section in the stadium, he is imposing himself in his opposition’s space. He is turning a section of the field the opposition has designated and defended as the last bastion of their defense into a stage for celebration. Not to mention, the opposing team still has to go through the curiously awkward process of retrieving the ball from the back of the net and returning it to the center circle.
Here are three prime examples of Müller in full “this is my penalty box now”-mode:
1. Bayern vs Sporting Lisbon – March 2009 – Champions League Round of 16
This was Müller’s first goal in the Champions League at the age of 19. The boy knew how to celebrate even at that tender age.
In a classic example of the raumdeuter-ing that would come to define his career, Müller finds a pocket of space in the middle of the Sporting six yard box to easily poke home a Bayern corner (notice on the replay it definitely comes off his shin. Also classic.) And then, he just stays where he is! If I was 19 and had just scored my first Champions League goal, I have no doubt the adrenaline coursing through my veins would in no way allow me to stand still. Limbs would be flying, I’d be running around as fast as I possible could go, and there’s a fair chance I’d pull a hammy in all the excitement.
All in all, this is an astonishing early commitment to the art form from the young Müller.
2. Bayern vs. Chelsea – May 2012 – Champions League Final
A goal which Müller believed he had won the Champions League with, only for some late period Didier Drogba heroics to level the scores and send the game in extra time. This is peak Müller. Ghosting his way to the back post to meet a deep cross, he then strains all the muscles in his neck to head the ball straight down into the ground. The angle of the bounce is so bizarre and unexpected that it then bouncing up and over a reasonably well-positioned Petr Cech before hitting the underside of the crossbar and going in.
Müller then continues his trot along the six yard box (Petr Cech’s personal space), before taking a left turn to the penalty spot both arms pumping in front of him like a man trying to shake the snow off a Christmas tree he’s about to chop down. Such is the energy of Müller’s parade around the penalty box and the weight of the goal he’s just scored, his teammates can’t help but get involved and initiate perhaps the most pure of all goal celebrations – the pile on. Sublime.
3. Germany vs. Italy – June 2022 – Nations League Group Stage
Lastly, just to show Müller is still committed to the form in the twilight of his career and also that he’s capable of some decent finishes every now and then, comes this goal against Italy in the Nations League. Also, this is the Nations League. Nobody really cares. The dude is celebrating like he just repelled an army of 300,000 Persian soldiers. Amazing stuff.
So, the next time you’re watching Bayern or Germany play, keep an eye out for everyone’s favorite space interpreter on the off chance he’ll score. I hope you can look past the gawky shinned finish angling into the roof of the net while the goalkeeper tries to figure out what happened and appreciate what comes next.
For the following 30 seconds, Thomas Müller will own the penalty area, not the other team. And, before he’s done, he’ll be back to own it again.
For context, Ronaldo is trying to signify that he scored 15 goals in the competition.
A note for American readers: a cricket wicketkeeper is equivalent to a catcher in baseball. Both from a functional standpoint – the role requires them to catch the ball as it’s “thrown” toward a batter – but also from a cultural standpoint. Wicketkeepers are often the eccentric weirdos of the team.
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