Calm down, it wasn’t the best goal of all time

What is it about the overhead kick that still has the ability to turn football fans of all persuasions into a blithering wreck and lose all sight of common sense?

When Sweden’s Zlatan Ibrahimovic scored his remarkable goal against England on Wednesday it was as if the entire world stood up as one in stunned amazement babbling insanely to whoever would listen.

How many texts must have pinged around the globe; mirroring the Tweet by Arsenal’s Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain which read: “Ohh myyy Laawwwwddd!! Zlatan #TakeABow”

Only the overhead kick can do that; it virtually guarantees its master instant recognition from anyone who has ever played the game. But, unfortunately, that’s a problem when it comes to placing Ibra’s goal in a list of the best scored in modern times.

Pundits were only too willing to describe it as the best goal of all time even before they started to think more seriously about it.

An overhead kick, you see, is football’s ultimate Hollywood moment as proven by The Great Escape; the goal the inner child in all of us wishes he could score, the goal we perfected at the age of 14 in a video arcade but never got anywhere near on the pitch.

But are we really saying that nobody in the history of football has scored a better, more beautiful, more technically difficult goal? Not Marco Van Basten with his incredible dipping, over-the-shoulder volley from a ludicrous angle for Holland in 1988? Not even Maradona when he weaved his way through the entire England before scoring in 1986 – and then did exactly the same against Belgium days later? And what about Pele? George Best? Lionel Messi? Cristiano Ronaldo? Did they never match Zlatan’s skill and audacity?

Calm down everyone and grasp reality because here are the reasons why Ibrahimovic’s goal, as good as it was, is nowhere near being number one. Zlatan’s skill level is incredible in the way he scores the goal; but the ball was almost still, bouncing perfectly when he hooked it over his head.

nThe goal came from a mistake by Joe Hart, there was no build-up play and no team play and the net was unguarded.

nThe goal came in a meaningless friendly; it was a beautiful moment but counted for nothing.

n The technique is astonishingly difficult but he isn’t the only player capable of an overhead kick; it looked spectacular but check out Hugo Sanchez’s goals for Real Madrid in the ’80s.

Of course, all of the above should not take away from Ibrahimovic’s goal and his overall performance and it will be a moment in football history long remembered. But so is Rene Higuita’s ‘scorpion’ kick save against England at Wembley in 2007; a moment that belongs as much to the circus as to football folklore.

When asked to talk about his goal the modest Ibrahimovic probably summed it up best: “I think it was a nice goal, I enjoy it very much, even if it was a friendly game. It was a nice goal.”

Nice, definitely – and one of the top five overhead-kick goals of all time, for sure. But the best goal ever? No chance.