A Solemn Chicken Playing Air Guitar: Fighting For The Soul of Goal Celebrations

Dominic Calvert-Lewin tucked away his penalty and raised a finger to his lips, shushing the mutinous Elland Road Kop. As he pranced in front of the stand, pointing to the name on his shirt, a grim-faced spectator raised her middle finger in salute. That finger expressed, with more eloquence than any words, how its owner felt about average players over-celebrating modest achievements. That’s also the gist of this blog, so if you can’t spare the three or four minutes to read it, just imagine a giant, raised middle finger in place of all this text, oscillating at modern football, and, more specifically, at modern goal celebrations.

I wasn’t always this old and bitter. As a kid, I used to favour the ‘Ravanelli’ celebration on the rare occasion I scored a goal. This (for the benefit of anyone younger than 35) involved stretching your shirt up and over your face, then running around the pitch blindly with your midriff exposed, hoping not to crash into anything. The ensuing 25 years have made my physique less suited to this mode of celebration, and left me with a deep mistrust of anyone young and virile enough to pull it off without distressing the neighbours.

This iconic celebration has been swallowed up by the mists of time, thanks in no small part to FIFA’s daft rules about shirt removal. And, having just come back from holiday nursing a heavy cold, I’m in the perfect frame of mind to sound off about modern goal celebrations, and how poorly they compare with those of the past. Join me as, like Grampa Simpson shaking his fist heavenward at an offending cloud, I rank modern celebrations, starting with the absolute dog excrement at the bottom and working upwards towards purer heights.

CRISTIANO RONALDO ‘SIUUUUU’ CELEBRATION

Propping up the rest of the pile is this one. You’ve seen it a million times, obviously, but I’ll describe it for the benefit of anyone who’s just rejoined society after twenty years living under a rock. It generally follows football’s most joyless automaton slotting home a penalty, and involves him running to the corner flag, performing a turning jump and landing with his back to a stand full of fawning acolytes, who all chorus ‘SIUUUUU’ as he stands in his favourite ‘come adore me’ pose. There’s no spontaneity or emotion — it’s simply what happens, with the inevitability of a Monday morning. It begs the question whether it even qualifies as a celebration, because, judging from his face, he doesn’t enjoy it. Score, run, jump, SIUUUUU. Rinse and repeat, then go home and spend the rest of the week drinking spinach smoothies and sulking about how everyone likes Lionel Messi more than you.

THE TODD CANTWELL DANCE

I want to be clear that I’m not against dancing in itself. I’m just against this particular combination of surfer hair, body popping and gurning facial expression. Three elements that are individually inoffensive but, when combined, induce instant nausea in anyone outside of Norwich. No thanks.

POINTING TO NAME ON SHIRT

‘Know my name, people of Leeds! For I am Dominic Calvert-Lewin, master of penalties! Behold as I score, uncontested, from a distance of twelve yards!’

Yeah. Get in the Mersey.

HEART HANDS CELEBRATION

Tricky one, this. When Gjanni Alioski used to perform it, usually after a wild howitzer landed in the goal more by accident than design, it was quite endearing. It came across as expressing a sincere love for the fans. When performed by a surly, top-knotted Gareth Bale, however, the gesture loses its purity. As with a few of the other celebrations on this list, the facial expression plays a huge part, and if you’re not prepared to go full Gjanni with this one — arms flying everywhere, tongue out and eyes rolling — you might as well not bother.

CRYPTIC HAND SIGNALS

This makes the top half because the detective work involved in translating the hand signals can actually be quite fun. Why is Patrick Bamford making gang signs? Is Kemar Roofe spelling out the name of his favourite fabric conditioner? Occasionally you’ll get one that’s easier to comprehend, like Jermaine Beckford signing ‘one-nil’ to the general fury of Huddersfield fans, or El Hadji Diouf’s ill-advised brandishing of his genitals at Brighton’s support after scoring a penalty. With a couple of overly performative exceptions, hand signal celebrations are fine, really, and are occasionally used to pay tribute to players’ children and loved ones, which not even I can really object to.

GYMNASTIC CELEBRATIONS

These ones are, by their nature, ostentatious, but you have to admire the skill involved. Take Trésor Kandol for instance, a player who (being kind) never seemed the most physically coordinated human being when in possession of a football. His best moment in a Leeds shirt was his late winner at Tranmere that juxtaposed an awkward, scrambled finish with the superlative roundoff/back handspring combination which followed it. It was beautiful. But was it as iconic as the lovably crap efforts of the 90s? Who doesn’t fondly remember Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink’s abortive cartwheel or Robbie Keane’s dive-roll-pistol-fingers routine? They were certainly easier to re-create in the school playground without snapping your spinal cord or landing head first on a cinder block.

ANYTHING BY LUKE AYLING

Some players just have that special something, and Bill is one of them. It’s an innate ability to make even the daftest celebration look good. Try to imagine Cristiano Ronaldo attempting to pull off Bill’s ‘solemn chicken’, or Jack Grealish breaking out the air guitar. Ugh.

Ayling is a natural entertainer, whose celebrations are as much of an event as his goals themselves. Players like him are important, because too many modern players look like they’ve forgotten the unique buzz they once got from scoring a goal in school football, back when football was just a game to them and not a job.

Ayling has never forgotten. You see it in his face every single time the ball hits the net. As Mark Twain once said, “Find a job you enjoy doing and you will never have to work a day in your life.”

Special mention also goes to Michail Antonio, a player who battled his way to the Premier League from non-league football, and, like Ayling, ‘gets it’. His recent celebration against Leicester, when he raised a life-size cardboard cutout of himself above his head, was joyous, but still pales in comparison to five years ago, when he lay on his side and ran around in a circle going ‘WOOP WOOP WOOP’ like Homer in the classic Simpsons episode ‘Last Exit to Springfield’.

I don’t think I’m being melodramatic saying that the soul of football is at stake here. There are children in schools all over the world celebrating goals by running to the corner of the pitch and performing the ‘Ronaldo’ accompanied by a reedy ‘siuuu’ from the two parents and a dog in attendance. It’s hideous, and if this sounds like something your child would do then it’s your duty as a parent to stamp out this behaviour.

When the joy of scoring becomes secondary to the lust for adulation, something has been lost. That’s why we need more Luke Aylings and fewer pillocks dancing with their backs to the crowd. Football’s a game, and games are meant to be enjoyed, so celebrate with a smile on your face or not at all. In a world where you can choose to be anything, be more Bill. ◉