WHEN he wasn’t tormenting England, having drug-induced heart attacks or shooting at journalists, Diego Maradona was a bit tidy on the old football pitch in his pomp.

We are not going to get into the Pele/Maradona debate so whether or not he was the best ever, there is no doubt Diego was no slouch.

On this day in 1988 he was playing for Napoli against their big rivals Milan in a Serie A match when he did something rather novel: he headed the ball, wait for it, with his head, rather than with his hand, which as we all know is how he usually heads it.

‘Yeah so what?’ I hear you cry. Well, not only did he head the ball into the net to score one of Napoli’s four goals in a 4-1 drubbing of the Milanesas, but he did it from well outside the box - a full eight to ten yards outside in fact. The Milan ‘keeper was nowhere to be seen so Maradona’s effort bounced into the back of the net and surely ranks as one of the longest ever headed goals in the history of the game, and one of the rare instances of scored headers from outside the box.

You can see an incredibly bad quality video of the feat by following this link and then selecting the clip second from bottom on the left hand side.

Among others to have achieved the feat of bulging the net from outside the box with headers are Steve Nichol who scored the winner for Liverpool at Highbury in 1987 with a long range bonce-effort, and the unlikely Carlton Palmer for Sheffield Wednesday against Everton at Goodison in 1993/94. Palmer headed the ball high up into the air from about 22 yards and the ball then dipped wickedly behind Neville Southall and nestled in the net.

Not to be outdone by Carlton Palmer (and who can blame him), Marco van Basten pulled off the feat in the 1989 European Cup semi-final first-leg against Real Madrid. He was outside the box, facing his own goal, and he lobbed a long clearance backwards over the keeper and into the top corner. Have a look at the goal here.

Before you go have a little look below and the clip reel which serves a nice homage to the humble header, and have a look at what else happened on this day here.

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