by Dominic Wells

Created on: September 07, 2008

At first, you may think that Geometry doesn't have a great deal to do with soccer, or if it does then it is not very important. The truth is though, that almost every aspect of soccer, many other sports included, encorporates geometry to one degree or the another.
Let's first look at the soccer ball itself. It is not, despite what people may think, a perfect sphere. Despite this, every year or so, Nike or another maker of soccer balls will produce a new soccer ball hailed as "rounder" than previous models. Why is this significant? what does it affect? Well, it affects everything from the flight of the ball, the bounce of the ball, to one's ability to control the ball. Just like the weight of the ball contributes to the balls flight, so does the shape. Before the recent Euro 2008 finals, several goalkeeper's expressed concern about the new balls being used in the tournament. Czech Republic's Petr Cech, hailed as one of the best keepers in the game, stated that the new ball was getting harder to predict in flight, making long-shots prone to curve more in the air and swerve past a gasping keeper who had thought he had the flight nailed.

Moving onto goalkeepers then, geometry is always at play with the positioning of a goalkeeper. Why does every keeper rush out to meet an oncoming playing before he strikes the ball? Simple. The closer the keeper can get to the ball, the small his target area becomes and the larger the keeper's chances of being able to block the ball. A striker faced with an onrushing keeper is suddenly faced with a large goalkeeper in front of him, a smaller goal, and few paths to kick the ball, forcing them to try and dribble round the keeper, hit a curved or lobbed shot (more on them later) or shoot early before the keeper can close the gap.
The goalkeeper's positioning is not the only positioning which requires geometry. The whole formation of a team relies on angles, lines, and shapes. How many times have you seen a teams' defeat be blamed on its inability to maintain formation. If you look at the most common formation 4-4-2 (4 defenders, 4 midfielders and 2 attackers)you can see why this has always been a preferred option for many teams. The lines not only allow a number of different paths for a player to kick the ball between opposition players, but also helps defenders using the off-side rule. Let's say the defence start with the ball. They have many options, diagonal 'through-balls' past oncoming attackers, side-ways 'square-balls' to another

• 1
• 2
• Next Page >>