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The Worst Soccer Fails Of 2014

Fail Army has released a compilation of the best (worst?) soccer fails of 2014, and it is quite a compilation at that. Please, witness the ineptitude of the human race:

We decided to have some fun and make an officially unofficial list of the top 5 soccer fails of 2014. It was hard work, but someone had to do it. So, without further ado, here is the best (worst?) top 5 you will see all day.

5. Ball Kicked At Passing Train Bounces Back Onto Train - 4:02

"All by my se-eh-elf!" Photo: YouTube

The18 knows that you all have lost plenty of balls in your life, but this takes the cake. This soccer-ball-turned-railroad-drifter practically wanted to be whisked away. 

As cool as it is to kick stuff at a moving train, there are few things that can ruin a soccer ball as completely as a 3000 ton metal behemoth traveling at 45 miles per hour. So let’s just get one thing clear: no one that wants to keep a soccer ball intact and in their possession should kick it at a moving train. If these guys weren’t aware of this, the soccer ball should have been able to sue for negligence. The ball however, had a different sense of justice. The poetic kind. 

Instead of getting caught between wheel and railway, and getting eviscerated in a split second, it gets carried away perfectly intact. Not only that, but the ball practically decided to ride the train. Its first bounce carried it back toward the kicker, but it was just like, “Nope!” and bounced right back onto the train.

It wouldn’t be the first ball to abandon a relationship…

4. Coach Takes A Dive - 2:18

 Photo: YouTube

 Photo: YouTube

This is pathetic. Of all the traits managers should transfer from their days as players, one would think diving would be at the very bottom. No one told this guy. 

We cannot tell if the shocked expression on his face as he clutches his neck is a result of him thinking, I can’t believe this guy would touch me, or, I can’t believe I’m actually doing this. 

We will never know if this sideline dive drew a yellow card or even an ejection, as the clip is cut short, but we can hope that the culpable coach’s ego still hasn’t recovered.

3. Worst. Set Piece. Ever. - 0:27

Photo: YouTube

Speaking of terrible coaches, who in the name of everyone that is sane came up with this strategy. This writer has played soccer since he was 4 and watched it since he was 16 and has never, ever seen a team place its own players in front of the opposing wall on a set piece. WHAT COULD THIS POSSIBLY ACCOMPLISH, EXCEPT THE BALL HITTING SAID PLAYERS!?! Unsight the keeper, you say? There are 3 players directly behind the kneeling two for that.

Did those two players lose a bet? Were they on the coach’s bad side? Was everyone involved in this game just doing it for the lulz? 

It is rare that The18 hopes liquor was involved in a coaching decision, but inebriation is a far more comforting scape-goat than a sober coach who has absolutely no idea what he is doing.  

2. Random Lady Head Shots Child That Is Not Her Own - 1:10 

Photo: YouTube

The18 would be willing to bet a not inconsequential amount of money that, before this incident, the lady walking along the sidewalk hadn’t even accidentally nudged a soccer ball in years. 

We would also bet even more money that she hasn’t kicked one since. 

Look at how far she winds up! Look how she just toe-pokes the ball like some kindergartener! 

Every soccer player knows that you toe-poked the ball as a kid because it was the easiest way to get power on a shot, and, hopefully, most of you stopped at age 12 when you realized that toe-pokes are the least accurate way to kick a ball. 

This lady, however, probably last developed as a soccer player at age 6, and thus never attained the subsequent wisdom she would have gained as a player at age 12. If time travel existed, we would go back to the morning before her “incident” and give her one message:

We’d just let her figure out the rest.

1. Player Scores Terrible Goal. Headbutts Through Plexiglass In Celebration. Gets Sent Off. - 4:17

Photo: YouTube

This clip has become an instant classic, and The18 understands if you are a bit miffed that we are giving the #1 spot to a video that you might have seen before.

We apologize for nothing. 

Honestly, the title we have given to this winning entry should be all that we need to say about this clip, but that would just be a cop out, wouldn’t it? So we would like to bring attention to the unsung hero of this clip: our cranially concerned number 9’s triumphant run from goal mouth to plexiglass window. 

Notice how he juts along the pitch, nodding as if saying, “I am going to do it!” Admire his pre-headbutt embodiment of a some one who is about to give a headbutt, and how, retrospectively, that makes the headbutt seem like an inevitability. Try to pinpoint the exact moment when he realizes that inevitability, and makes up his mind to round his excited teammates and head for the plexiglass window. Drink it all in.

World class theatre, that’s what this clip is. You have the setting of the free kick, the false climax of the terrible goal (it is terrible and you know it), the rising action of the run, the true climax of the head-butt, and the conclusion of the red card. 

Bravo, we say, Bravo.

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