Schick in the company of Ronaldo or Salah? His Euro goal is in the final nomination for the Puskás Award!

Czech national football player Patrik Schick can win a big individual award. His half-court strike into the Scotland net at last year’s Euros has been shortlisted for the prestigious FIFA Puskás Award for the best goal of the year. The announcement will be made on 17 January.

Cristiano Ronaldo, Neymar, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Olivier Giroud, Mohamed Salah and Son Heung-min. Pretty big names, don’t you think? Soon, one Czech may be added to the list – Patrik Schick. They are all winners of the FIFA Puskás award for the best goal of the year, and the national striker made it to the final three for last year’s one.

The World Football Federation has published the shortlist of candidates to win the prestigious award on its website. The public will find out who will win it on January 17, when an online ceremony takes place in Zurich, Switzerland.

The top three goals scored in 2021 were decided by football fans, who chose from 11 candidates in an online vote. Until 2018, the public also chose the overall winner. However, after controversy and guesswork over whether Mohamed Salah’s goal, which won that year, was actually the best, FIFA decided to modify the procedure.

As last year, when Son Heung-min won the award, the finalists are now selected by an expert jury. What are the options?

Firstly, the wonderful goal by the Czech national striker and Bayer Leverkusen player Patrik Schick from the European Championship match against Scotland.

Still 25 years old, the Prague native spotted the run of the opponent’s goalkeeper David Marshall and beat him perfectly with a shot from an incredible 49.7 metres. He helped Jaroslav Šilhavy’s charges to a three-point gain for a 2:0 result and thus to advance to the knockout stage.

The second option is the Argentine midfielder, at that time in the service of Tottenham, now Sevilla, Erik Lamela and his crazy rabona from the spring derby in the Premier League against Arsenal. He embarrassed Arsenal midfielder Partey, whose ball went between his legs and skidded to the far post of the home goal.

It was a truly crazy game for Lamela, by the way. He came on as a substitute in the 19th minute when he had to replace the injured Son Heung-min. Twelve minutes later, he was enjoying an incredible goal and finished his performance in the 76th minute by being sent off for a second yellow card. Spurs lost 1: 2.

And for the third time, there is Iranian striker Mehdi Taremi. He also scored a goal, with which he aspires to win the Puskás Award, last spring, on 13 April. Back then, his Porto played a Champions League quarter-final rematch with Chelsea and were 2 goals down after the home game.

Thanks to the beautiful scissors of Taremi, the Portuguese team surprisingly beat the opponent from the British Isles, but it was not enough to advance further. Unfortunately, the goal against the later winner of the whole competition came in the 94th minute and the match ended 1:0.

Source: FIFA