Lessons in Goal Celebration from Roger Milla and others

In the old times, goal celebrations were very boring and didn’t have any style in them. If you watch Rivelino WC old famous goals, you would notice that he used to run a lot, then when he does not know what else to do, he just stops. Well, even scoring a decisive goal in the WC final, the guy was running out of any ideas, that was Alessandro Altobelli in 1982. Okay, that was of exaggeration, as his colleage Tardelli was so famous for his crazy run when he scored the second goal few minutes earlierin the same WC final.

Hugo Sanchez was bit creative, with his famous ‘Olympic’ jump after the goal, but he had a special acrobatic body, and it was an exception. And sometimes, celebration are more exciting, like this shocking goal and spontonuous celebration from Haiti in the 1974 WC against Italy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=i5OLw0GiaeE

But that was it!There was not much fun outside the play itself.

Then, Roger Milla came in 1990 and changed the rules of the game. He became famous with his goal dance. Not sure if he was the leading one, at least in World Cups, or some other players had some moves before him, but seems that adding a move to celebrate the goal was with him.

It is like the Mexican waves among fans, there were so much debate, research and claims, on how really the waves started, I read that it was even not in football, but in other sports, but it is linked to Mexico 1986 WC.

Four years later, Bebeto celebrated in a very special way his goal vs. Netherlands as he had a baby at that day. Since then, it became part of the game, and it was apparent, if a team does not have a way to celebrate, may be they are missing something in team work.

Ever wondered how difficult it is to learn some goal celebrations moves? some of them are more difficult than scoring the goal itself. Here is a very funny video, to teach you how to do the best moves of WC 2010 celebrations, it was called Roger Milla Celebration Show:

If you wonder how South Africa trained on their goal celebrations, here are some tips:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=G7NEgfUXBfo

Or if you wonder how Ghana do their celebrations, here are clues:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=wBsr9PV8Mg8

Also, Ghana had another celebration especial to USA game, here is the manual how to do it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=D8ZkMw7wRi0

You can watch some other teams celebrations at Roger Milla Show YouTube ChannelWell, to be frank, though I found new celebrations so funny, but I prefer this type of classic celebrations.