A guide to truly appalling corner kicks

There is not a football fan in the world who believes their team to be good at corners. Oh, sure, everybody cheers when the referee awards the thing, but they do so out of habit, as an acknowledgement that some kind of forward progress is being made. They know, deep down, that the ball is going one of three places: into the face of the first defender; into the arms of the goalkeeper; or into the empty space on the other side of the penalty area.

Even worse, it might be taken short. The horror.

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As with their more usual brethren, there are three kinds of Bad Corner.

The “Oh, I Forgot About The Corner Flag.” And in some ways it’s perhaps the most understandable: football isn’t usually played with flags dotted about the pitch. Here’s Lukas Podolski doing the same thing for Internazionale. Note the little hop after the event, presumably in case the referee feels like penalizing the flag for obstruction.

Not all corner flags are quite so subtle. Here, Aras Ozbiliz is on the receiving end of a brutal reducer. To make matters worse, the linesman appears to be about to give a free kick for handball! The flag gets away with it!

Serge Gakpé‘s not falling for that, though. Observe how he rides the challenge from the corner flag and keeps his cool.

We close this section with the emergence of an exciting new sub-genre. Forgetting about the flag is one thing. But forgetting about the existence of (and so being ambushed by) solid ground is almost nihilistic in its negligence, such that we can only assume that Gregg Wylde, below, isn’t so much taking a corner as he is screaming for help in the only language he understands.

Perhaps slightly rarer, if only because most professional footballers can usually kick a stationary ball to roughly the right place. It’s part of the job. But every now and then something goes profoundly wrong, and we encounter “Oh, I Didn’t Know My Own Strength,” as demonstrated expertly here by Alessandro Diamanti.

Even better, we think, was this effort from Keisuke Honda. Not only does it go higher, but it actually drops to one of his teammates on the other side. It almost works! Sadly, the officials had already called a stop to proceedings, as the ball had already drifted out of play. Or because the linesman was struggling to keep a straight face.

As above, footballers haven’t been shy of reinventing the form. Here, Marquinhos -- possibly not that one -- cleverly toys with his audience’s expectations, presenting them with the subversive “Oh, I Didn’t Know My Own Weakness.”

And here’s Nenad Milijas working along the same lines. Almost looks sarcastic, this one. Like he’s deliberately attempting to goad the player running for the short corner. “Want the ball, do you? Do you? Oh dear. It’s over there.”

Among the rarest and most precious sights on a football pitch. It’s full title is unwieldy -- “Oh, I Totally Forgot That These Were The Closing Stages Of A Title-Deciding Game That We Are Losing And So The One Thing That I Must Absolutely Not Do Is Pass The Ball Straight To An Opponent” -- but it’s okay. Just call it “The Aspas.” Everybody will know what you mean. (Maybe mute this one.)

Finally, just for fun, here’s a man tackling himself and falling on his ass.