No handlebars here. In football, a bicycle kick — also known as an overhead or scissors kick — is one of the boldest moves in the game. It happens when a player leaps into the air, flips backward, and strikes the ball with both feet off the ground while facing away from goal. It’s athletic, instinctive, and unforgettable.
From Garnacho’s Premier League stunner to Zlatan’s long-range strike, these are some of the most unforgettable bicycle kicks ever scored.
🇦🇷 Alejandro Garnacho – Everton vs. Manchester United (2023/24 Premier League)
Garnacho shocked Goodison Park with a ridiculous bicycle kick just minutes into the match. The height, timing, and confidence were all there. Bruno Fernandes summed it up after the game. “He’s watching too many Cristiano clips.”
🏴 Gareth Bale – Real Madrid vs. Liverpool (2018 Champions League Final)
Bale came off the bench, then made history. His overhead kick in the Champions League final didn’t just give Madrid the lead. It became the defining image of the match.
🇧🇷 Rivaldo – Barcelona vs. Valencia (2001 La Liga)
Barcelona needed a win to qualify for the Champions League. Rivaldo delivered, finishing a hat trick with an overhead kick from outside the box in the final moments.
🇸🇪 Zlatan Ibrahimović – Sweden vs. England (2012 Friendly)
The ball hung in the air. Zlatan turned, jumped, and somehow volleyed it in from over 30 yards. It was his fourth of the night and one of the wildest goals the game has ever seen.
🏴 Wayne Rooney – Manchester United vs. Manchester City (2011 Premier League)
The Manchester derby was in the balance. Rooney twisted midair and hit it clean. The strike flew into the top corner. Old Trafford exploded.
🇵🇹 Cristiano Ronaldo – Real Madrid vs. Juventus (2018 Champions League Quarter Final)
Even Juventus fans applauded. Ronaldo got off the ground like a gymnast, connected perfectly, and scored a goal that left Buffon rooted.
🇲🇽 Manuel Negrete – Mexico vs. Bulgaria (1986 World Cup)
A slick exchange and a soft layoff set up Negrete for one of the most graceful goals in tournament history. He floated into the kick and sent the ball into the corner.
🇮🇹 Mauro Bressan – Fiorentina vs. Barcelona (1999 Champions League)
From more than 30 yards out, Bressan launched himself backward and looped the ball into the net. It was outrageous and unforgettable. Watch.
🇩🇪 Emre Can – Liverpool vs. Watford (2017 Premier League)
Can’s bicycle kick came from a full sprint and broke open a match that had been stuck in first gear. It was clean, balanced, and instinctive.
🇫🇷 Philippe Mexès – Milan vs. Anderlecht (2012 Champions League)
Mexès took the ball down with his chest, then pulled off an overhead strike that curled perfectly into the far corner. It didn’t look real.
🇧🇪 Christian Benteke – Liverpool vs. Manchester United (2015 Premier League)
Benteke hit this in one motion, catching the ball perfectly as it dropped. Even though Liverpool lost, the strike was pure class.
Cristiano Ronaldo – Al Nassr vs Al Khaleej, Saudi Pro League (2025)
Just when it felt like Cristiano Ronaldo had ticked every box the game could offer, he went and added another bicycle kick to the personal highlight reel. Deep into stoppage time of Al Nassr’s 4–1 win over Al Khaleej in Riyadh, the 40-year-old drifted into the box, waited for Nawaf Boushal’s looping cross from the right and exploded upward, back to goal, to meet it. The contact was clean and violent, the ball flying beyond the goalkeeper and into the corner while Al-Awwal Park briefly forgot to breathe.
On its own, it is a ridiculous goal for any player. In Ronaldo’s case it is also his 954th in official competition and the latest chapter in a career that keeps refusing to slow down. The technique inevitably invites comparisons with his famous overhead against Juventus in 2018, but there is a different layer here: this is a veteran striker, closing in on Al Nassr’s all-time scoring record, still chasing perfection in the 96th minute of an early-season league match. It also landed days after Scott McTominay’s viral bicycle kick for Scotland, turning the overhead into an unlikely point of rivalry.
Scott McTominay – Scotland vs Denmark, World Cup qualifier (2025)
If Ronaldo’s goal felt like a sequel, Scott McTominay’s overhead kick against Denmark looked like something entirely new. In Scotland’s must-win final qualifier at Hampden, with a first World Cup since 1998 on the line, Ben Gannon-Doak clipped a high cross into the box in the third minute. McTominay was ten yards out, facing away from goal, ball around head height. He launched into the air, scissored his right leg over his head and steered the ball past Kasper Schmeichel before landing in a heap on the turf and disappearing under a pile of navy shirts.
The goal did more than give Scotland an early lead in a 4–2 win that finally ended nearly three decades of “glorious failure.” Analysts have since estimated that McTominay’s toe made contact with the ball around 2.53 meters off the ground, a height that would eclipse even Ronaldo’s Juventus overhead and is now being examined by Guinness World Records as a potential benchmark for bicycle kicks. Whether or not it ends up in the record books, the image of McTominay suspended in the Glasgow night, body horizontal, Hampden roaring and a World Cup place suddenly feeling real, already belongs to Scottish football history.
