How to - Corner Kicks - Corner Kicks

You might have noticed that in England, corner kicks are greeted with almost as much cheering as penalty kicks. The English are well known for their heading prowess and what better opportunity to display your heading goal scoring skills if not from a corner. Of course, the scoring rate is nowhere near as high from a C.K as it is from a penalty, but as with all set pieces, they offer a great goal opportunity where tactics can have a larger influence. Let's take a look at some of the basic corner kick strategies and see what principles they rely upon.

Penalty Spot Corner – This type of corner involves the kick taker trying to hit the ball so that it falls somewhere around the penalty spot area. Usually, a quality cross should land in the 5 yards between the goalkeeper's protection box and the penalty spot and it's this area that will be attacked. The goalkeeper will have a hard time coming out to clear the cross so far away from his goal and the slightest deflection can easily push the ball inside the net.

Near Post Corner – As the name suggests, the corner taker will hit the cross so that it lands at the near post (the post closer to the corner kick taker), where a teammate will rush in and flick the ball with his head, either towards the goal, or towards the same area mentioned in the example above. Adding that extra pulley in the player who flicks the ball from the near post creates chaos in the opposing team's defense system, which is why this type of corner can be pretty tricky to deal with.

Far Post Corner – The same principle is applied as with the near post corner, however a player will rush out to the far post, where he will try to head the ball back to his teammates in the penalty spot area for the decisive blow.

Short Corner – The short C.K involves two players standing near the flag, with the kick taker passing the ball to the second player and developing the play from there. The advantage is that the cross can be taken further away from the goal line, so a player can imprint an inwards swirl to it, which would otherwise take the ball out of bounds if tried straight from the corner.

You could also end up having 2 players against one in the corner, allowing you to create offensive superiority on the flank, followed by a penetration in the penalty box by one of the two players taking part in the short corner.

Long Shot Corner – Don't be confused by the name, this won't require you to shoot at the goal straight from the corner. Instead, you'll want to lob the ball somewhere around 18-20 yards, just outside the penalty box, where a player will come in unmarked, unleashing a volley. This type of corner is hard to execute, since it requires a perfect pass and a perfect volley, but when it does work, it will most likely be a great scoring opportunity.

Obviously, there will be a lot of combination between these tactics and a coach might even want to make up his own tactics derived from these "standard" ones, in order to surprise the opposing team. In any corner kick strategy you use, you'll want to have two players with special jobs. One will be the "garbage player", positioned on the other side of the penalty box from where the corner is being taken. His main role will be to collect the cross in case it passes through or over all the players in the box, re-crossing it if possible.

The other player will be the "safety net" and will be positioned around 25-30 yards from the other team's goal, centrally. His job will be to collect any balls that are deflected from the penalty box and stop the other team's potentially deadly counter attacks. If the safety net player can shoot the ball as soon as he gets it, even better, but it's advisable to simply clear it in order to allow your teammates to get back to their defensive positions.