Take a look through the BBC Goal of the Season Wikipedia page and you will find your fair share of mazy individual runs, long-range thunderbolts, pinpoint free-kicks and intricate team moves. There is, though, only one scissor-kick.
Paolo Di Canio’s breathtaking volley for West Ham against Wimbledon at Upton Park on 26 March 2000, was a worthy winner of the award that year.
Better was to come later down the line. In 2016, during West Ham’s final season at the Boleyn Ground, Di Canio’s strike was voted the best ever witnessed in the stadium’s 112-year history.
It isn’t an easy goal to forget, but here’s a quick recap anyway: Trevor Sinclair receives a square pass by the right touchline and drives a swerving cross-field pass towards Di Canio on the left-hand side of the penalty area. Di Canio tracks the ball’s path, leaps into the air with both feet off the ground and smashes a first-time volley with the outside of his right foot beyond Neil Sullivan into the bottom corner. Upton Park erupts.
19 years later, we still wonder how Di Canio did it 😲#GoalOfTheDay #PL @WestHam pic.twitter.com/1Z4g0R6d0c
— Premier League (@premierleague) October 1, 2019
Not even the man himself knows how he managed to execute it.
Speaking before the lights went out on West Ham’s spiritual home, Di Canio said: “To be honest, I don’t know how it happened. We used to try things in training, but normally from the middle of the goal. From a wide area, it was really, really difficult.
“I need to thank Trevor and God, because just for one goal, it was a magical moment, even though it wasn’t in a Champions League final! Thanks to Trevor and all the fans as we celebrated together.”
Di Canio at West Ham
Paolo Di Canio arrived at West Ham in a £1.5m deal from Sheffield Wednesday in January 1999, following four months of inactivity after being suspended for pushing referee Paul Alcock during a Premier League game against Arsenal.
Harry Redknapp, West Ham’s manager at the time, had to field uncomfortable questions about the club’s purchase of Di Canio, but he argued that the Italian was worth the hassle, saying at his unveiling: “He can do things with the ball that people can only dream of.”
Di Canio went on to enjoy a successful four-and-a-half year spell with the Hammers, scoring 51 goals in 141 games and winning the club’s Hammer of the Year in 2000. In 2005, two years after leaving West Ham, Di Canio attracted criticism by stating that he is a ‘fascist’ while playing for Lazio.
Three goalkeepers wouldn’t have been able to keep it out, let alone one. Sullivan was between the sticks for Wimbledon that afternoon, just as he was when David Beckham announced himself on the opening day of the 1996-97 season, with *that* goal from the halfway line.
“The dive was just a token dive!” Sullivan admitted afterwards. “It was more fall over than a dive as it came off his foot like a bullet. To actually do that takes some guts to do it! It could have gone anywhere, but it went right in the far corner.”
Appropriately for an iconic Premier League goal, Di Canio’s effort was accompanied by the backing vocals of Sky Sports’ main man Martin Tyler in the gantry on a Super Sunday.
“Sinclair’s cross, over Cunningham’s head. DI CANIOOOO-OOHHHHH!” Tyler shrieked in audible shock. “I do not believe that! That is sensational! Even by his standards!”
Andy Gray, Tyler’s co-commentator on the day, applied the finishing touches to his colleague’s set-up with his trademark line: “Well, take a bow son. Take. A. Bow.”
Although West Ham only finished ninth in the Premier League that season, those were halcyon days for the club. Di Canio counted Rio Ferdinand, Frank Lampard, Michael Carrick, Freddie Kanoute and Joe Cole among his teammates. Harry Redknapp and Frank Lampard Snr were the management team. Even the kit was a classic: manufactured by Fila and sponsored by Dr Martens.
While that squad perhaps should have achieved more, they did provide West Ham fans with some incredible memories. None more so than Di Canio’s moment of magic.