5 football skill moves you rarely see on the pitch

Believe it or not football, in its best element, does have an air of grace and elegance – after all, it’s a form of entertainment. While managers try their upmost to morph their team into a unit and negate their team playing as a group of individual showboaters, for the fans the odd spark of skill is paramount in igniting the imagination. Some of the finest players in the world have mastered, and some even created, signitature moves to dodge opponents or leave defenders snapping at their heels. As with some of the finest players to grace the international stage, these fancy flicks and maneuvering moves may offer some a linguistic tango and, therefore, few recognise what is meant by them. So I have compiled a list of football skill terms you may have heard of, maybe even appreciated the poetic value, but have seldom been able to identify.

#1 Elastico

 

Also known as la culebrita or, less excitingly, ‘the flip-flap’, the Elastico really is your bog-standard footballing feint. The move has become a paramount weapon in an attacking player’s arsenal, as it allows an individual to elude a host of defending players with a single touch.

Popularised especially by the string of Brazilian showboaters of time gone by, but invented originally by Japanese-Brazilian Sérgio Echigo, the Elastico is used to trick an opposing player such that the individual in possession of the ball is intending to go one way, but is, in fact, heading in the other direction. Ultimately, this piece of trickery requires sound balance, clinical agility and an explosion of pace.

In order to carry out this famed move, you must firstly place the ball behind your favoured foot, which you then use to prod the ball to your preferred side. As the ball rolls, slip your foot underneath and past it and tap it the other way with the inside of your boot. 

It was Rivellino who pioneered this magical move, after being taught by Echigo in a Corinthians youth-team training session. Today it really is a mere shadow of some of the astounding aesthetics we marvel at in a game of football, but it still remains one of the most important. The Elastico was the first of its kind and, after the likes of Rivellino himself both Ronaldo and Ronaldinho mastered it, and this set the foundations for many of the silky skills we see today.