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The Greatest Goal Celebrations Of All Time

The Greatest Goal Celebrations Of All Time

The Greatest Goal Celebrations Of All Time

This weekend just gone has seen some great coordination in the Bundesliga.

No, we're not referring to Borussia Dortmund's free-flowing football. Instead, we're talking about their extra-slick goal celebration. When Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang opened the scoring in the 3-0 win over Schalke on Saturday, he and teammate Marco Reus ran to the corner flag to put on Batman and Robin masks.

But they're not the first players to use props, choreography, or just good old-fashioned spur-of-the-moment rage to celebrate slapping one in the onion bag. 

In no particular order, here's our rundown of the 25 best goal celebrations of all time.

"The Klinsmann"

From 1.54 onwards in this clip, you can see Spurs' new signing Jurgen Klinsmann raise two fingers to the British press. The papers had attacked him for being a diver prior to the start of the 1994/95 season. So, when he scored a debut goal in the 4-3 win at Sheffield Wednesday, the German international used his celebration to give them a bit of stick back. A superb statement, continually imitated by players and fans ever since. (This being the worst example.)


The Tardelli Scream

Probably the ultimate expression of how much football means to a nation. Marco Tardelli's scream of passion, tears running down his face, came after he scored Italy's second goal against West Germany in the 1982 World Cup final. This, we can see, is what true relief feels like. Italy won 3-1.


Gazza's "Dentist Chair"

Had Scotland's Gary McAllister slotted his penalty past David Seaman, England's Euro '96 campaign might have been very different. Instead, McAllister missed and, barely a minute later, Paul Gascoigne was flicking the ball over Colin Hendry's head and thrashing it into the net. Cue his now infamous "dentist's chair" celebration, a reference to an extreme drinking game played by the squad on a team-bonding trip to Hong Kong. And to think that, these days, we get in a huff when Jack Wilshere has a fag. Times have changed.


Temuri Ketsbaia Gets Cross About Something

Few sights in football have surpassed the spectacle of Georgian international and professional lunatic Temuri Ketsbaia giving an advertising hoarding a good kicking. Superb.


Diego Maradona at USA 1994

Do you believe this is the face of a drug user? Just asking.


Ade Akinbiyi Is Ripped

Ade Akinbiyi became Leicester City's record signing when they paid Wolves £5.5million in July 2000. However, things didn't go well. In his second season he hit a 15-game goalless streak, turning in a performance against Liverpool that was so bad the home support began to boo. When he did finally grab a goal (at 1.46 in this clip) he went berserk, tearing his shirt off like football's version of The Hulk. Except Ade is arguably bigger. Just look at the size of him!


Get Out Of Stuart Pearce's Way

If Ade Akinbiyi felt relief, imagine what Stuart Pearce felt. Six years on from his crucial miss against West Germany in a World Cup semi-final, England's left back stepped up to take another important penalty. However, in the Euro '96 Championship quarter-final against Spain, he scored. What you can see from 0.30 seconds onwards is a man removing the albatross from round his neck, barbequeing it using the flames coming from his nostrils, and serving it up for lunch. Heroic.


Alan Shearer's Arm

Alan Shearer is, let's be fair here, extremely boring. The simplicity of his trademark goal celebration - wheeling away with one arm held aloft - is also extremely boring. However, he scored so many goals - 409 in his career - that we grew to have a grudging respect for it. And anyway, worse people have made a career of putting their arms straight up in the air. Tony Adams. Paolo Di Canio. Hitler. On reflection, Alan's a nice safe option.


Roger Milla's Dance

Cameroon were the surprise package at Italia '90, announcing themselves with a shock defeat of Argentina, the reigning world champions, in their very first match. Better than that, though, was Roger Milla's celebration: running to the corner flag to perform a sort of jiggling dance. Watch the first goal and admire the build-up play: the vision from the centre half, plus Big Roger's perfectly fair challenge on the centre half. Yet more evidence that football is a changed game.


Lee Bradbury's Punchout

What a knockout! When Bournemouth manager Jimmy Quinn sent his team for some boxing training in 2008, he reckoned striker Lee Bradbury was the finest pugilist in the squad. Clearly, those comments went to Bradbury's head, as he chose to celebrate his next goal with this well choreographed celebration.


Edmilson Ferreira And His Sweaty Carrot

When Edmilson Ferreira scored this screamer for Atletico Mineiro against their fierce rivals America MG, he did something quite odd. He produced a carrot from his pants and ate it. Apparently, this is because America's nickname is "The Rabbits", and not because he was hungry. The seemingly innocuous incident actually caused massive crowd problems, and led to an opponent getting sent off for a bad tackle on Ferreira, apparently in retribution. Silly, really. We thought it was quite bunny.


Mario Gjurovski Tries To Flout The Rules, Gets Sent Off

Mario plays for Muangthong United in Thailand. He's not stupid. He knows the rules. You can't take your shirt off when you score a goal. Instead, he takes his shorts off and puts them on his head, like any right-thinking footballer would do in the grips of euphoria. Except, oh dear, that's a booking too. And he was already on a yellow...


"The Salmon" 

Ian Wright's brief stint in Scottish football is remembered for very little. In fact, this absurd celebration, performed after scoring Celtic's sixth goal against Aberdeen in December 1999, might be the just about the most memorable bit. Not quite a popular as the Klinsmann, but it did make it onto the FIFA computer games.


Eric Cantona Just Sort Of Stands There

Like the celebration, we don't need to add anything here.


Francesco Totti Takes A Selfie

Francesco Totti celebrated a goal in his 40th Rome derby by taking a selfie with the fans. The match finished 2-2, thanks to his equaliser. What a hero.


Iceland's FC Stjarnan Basically Win At Celebrations

FC Stjarnan have covered off all the best goal celebrations. To the point that we're wondering why we've even bothered with this list. One of their highly-choreographed moves is called 'The Human Toilet'. Enjoy.


Jimmy Bullard Tells His Teammates Off

In December 2008, Hull City were 4-0 down at half time away to Manchester City. Manager Phil Brown was furious and conducted his team-talk on the pitch in front of the Hull supporters. It remains a notorious incident, and one that cheeky chappie Jimmy Bullard found all-too-easy to parody on the club's next visit to the Etihad.


Adebayor Rubs Arsenal Fans' Noses In It

Still at the Etihad now, where things get personal. Arsenal and Emmanuel Adebayor didn't part on the best of terms. Hence the Togo international's delight at scoring against his former team. His celebration included a 90-yard sprint and knee-slide in front of the travelling supporters. They weren't awfully happy. Even less so when it finished 4-2 to City.

Matthew Russell Seems Like A Great Guy

When Matthew Russell scored this goal for Castleton Gabriels, he seized the opportunity to grab a seat in the empty stand and applaud himself. What a guy.


Van Nistelrooy's Revenge

Ruud Van Nistelrooy missed a penalty against Andorra and got some stick off their centre half. Fair play to Andorra, the perennial whipping boys of the European Championship qualifiers. Why not give the professionals a bit of friendly abuse? Except RVN couldn't wait to give some back...


Robbie Fowler Snorts The 6-yard line

Now, we're not suggesting that Robbie Fowler took any drugs. OK? We're simply not suggesting that. At all.


Hidetoshi Wakui's Literal Strike

Here's Hidetoshi Wakui. He plays for FC Nomme Kalju in Estonia and he has a cracking sense of humour.


We've No Actual Idea What's Going On Here

Well, OK. Maybe we do know a bit. Democratic Republic of Congo goalkeeper Robert Kidiaba is performing his famous "Bum Dance" goal celebration. Either that or he's got worms. We can't express how much we'd love to meet this guy.


The Aylesbury Ducks

To Aylesbury, now, where the year is 1994 (not permanently, we're talking like this for dramatic effect). In the second round of the FA Cup, Aylesbury Town defeat Kingstonian 4-1 to set up a lucrative tie against Premier League side QPR. It remains the greatest cup run in "The Ducks'" history, and it also gave us this classic celebration. 


On Me 'Ead, Son

Here we go. It's the big one: Pontilcelli vs. Riolo Terme in the Italian amateur leagues. Up pops Riolo Terme striker Jacopo Violan to slot the ball home. And is he delighted? No, that's a serious question. Is he delighted? We're still not sure. And we've watched this eighty times.