With his 95th-minute goal against Atletico Madrid on Tuesday evening, Lazio’s Ivan Provedel became just the fourth goalkeeper ever to score in the Champions League.
Provedel’s pin-point header past Jan Oblak not only gave the Serie A side a dramatic point, but it also provided a valuable reminder of the scarcity of game-changing goals scored by shot-stoppers over the years.
Keepers could go through their entire careers without getting on the scoresheet, or only do so by the virtue of a penalty in an increasingly desperate shoot-out.
But when a goalkeeper does step up in open play, the results can be transformative.
Here, Mail Sport remembers some of the most decisive and significant goals scored by keepers for club and country.
Ivan Provedel scored the only goal in Lazio’s Champions League clash against Atletico Madrid
The goalkeeper’s quick-thinking was a reminder of the rare magic of open-play keeper goals
ALISSON’S LATE WINNER AGAINST WEST BROM (MAY 2021)
For Premier League followers, few attempts by goalkeepers can match the magic that Alisson delivered on that fateful May day in 2021, even if they’re not fans of Liverpool.
The Reds were clinging on to the possibility of Champions League qualification after forcing their way back into contention but struggled away at West Brom.
With the crucial clash level at 1-1, Alisson connected seamlessly with Trent Alexander-Arnold’s corner and diverted his header into the top corner.
The Brazilian goalkeeper made history as he became the first goalkeeper in Liverpool’s 129-year history to score, but coach Jurgen Klopp was so wonderstruck he made it clear he had no expectation of seeing anything like it again.
‘If Olivier Giroud scores a goal like that, we say it is world class and we have to say the same for Ali,’ Klopp said. ‘If he never does it again, I’m absolutely fine with that!’
Alisson boosted Liverpool’s hopes of Champions League football with his late winner
Jurgen Klopp shared that he would happily never expect the same again from his goalkeeper
JIMMY GLASS RESCUES CARLISLE (MAY 1999)
Goals by ‘keepers rarely come with higher stakes than the ones behind Carlisle on the final day of the season in 1999. The Cumbrian side’s fate in Division Three appeared to have been sealed by a dismal campaign and they were heading down when drawing 1-1 draw at home against Plymouth Argyle.
Relying on results to go their way as Scarborough played Peterborough too, one point was far from enough to keep the team safe.
Expectations were low and tension was high: as per Sky Sports, the club’s manager had allowed the players to have a drink before kick-off to calm themselves down, and a bottle of brandy was shared around between the starting XI.
In just his third-ever appearance for the club, Glass – on emergency loan from Swindon Town – stepped up to join the melee in front of the six-yard box as Carlisle desperately prepared for a corner in the final minute of stoppage time after the 1-1 draw at Scarborough gave the side a faint hope.
The ball flew in to hit a Carlisle head and at first, it seemed like Plymouth’s goalkeeper had made the ensuing save. Instead, the ball was palmed down, and Glass didn’t think twice before leathering the shot past his opposite number to keep the club in the Football League.
RECORD-BREAKING ROGERIO CENI (AUGUST 2008)
The freescoring Sao Paulo legend has a simply titanic record – 1237 club appearances, over 25 years, and 20 major titles won between the sticks for both his domestic and national teams. But most impressive is Rogerio Ceni’s goalscoring record, which has seen the Brazilian net a whopping 131 times during his storied career. In second place, Jose Luis Chilavert. His tally? 67.
Ceni’s total came not just from his considerable haul of penalties taken, but freekicks too, with the goalkeeper frequently called upon by his managers to take the reins further up the pitch. A mammoth 69 of his goals came from the set-piece.
Whittling down the World Cup winner’s standout, therefore, could be challenging, but it bears mentioning that he broke Chilavert’s record in some style. Stepping up to take a freekick against Cruzeiro in the Brazilian top-flight, Ceni outfoxed the keeper with a neat strike bent around the wall just moments after stopping a penalty at the other end.
Ceni closed out the 2-2 match by scoring his own from the spot to salvage the draw.
Rogerio Ceni has a towering record on target, specialising in both penalties and freekicks
DERBY HERO JENS LEHMANN NETS FOR SCHALKE (DECEMBER 1997)
The future Arsenal goalkeeper will have been well aware of the significance of the Revierderby, having grown up in the Ruhr in the city of Essen. Throughout his ten-year career at Schalke, Jens Lehmann would feature in a number of the high-stakes clashes, but few would prove as satisfying as their tie in 1997.
In the final minute of the match, Lehmann made his way up the pitch to take part in a last-gasp corner attempt, and was perfectly poised at the far post to finish off his team-mate’s clattered shot from the penalty spot.
With the cunning move, Lehmann became the first goalkeeper in Bundesliga history to score from open play, as well as saving a hard-fought point against local rivals.
Lehmann had previously cemented his hometown hero status by playing a starring role in Schalke’s UEFA Cup victory a season early, but moved on to AC Milan at the end of the 1997/98 campaign.
A BRIGHT SPOT FOR BENEVENTO’S BRIGNOLI (DECEMBER 2017)
Spare a thought for Benevento, circa December 2017. Promoted to Serie A for the first time in their history that season, the Campania club set the record for the worst ever start to a season in Europe’s top five leagues and lost 14 matches in a row.
But in the 15th, salvation: facing the mighty AC Milan at home, Benevento were 2-1 down after Nikola Kalinic had snuffed out their equaliser in the 57th minute. A red card doled out to Alessio Romagnoli had handed the underdogs a lifeline 15 minutes before time, but they were yet to pull it.
Alberto Brignoli, on loan for Juventus in fifth temporary transfer away from Turin on the trot, arrived on the edge of the Milanese box for a final free kick in the 95th minute. With a confidence that belies the situation the club has found itself in since August, the goalkeeper flings himself into the throng in front of the six-yard box and bullets a header past a flabbergasted Gianluigi Donnarumma to snatch the triumphant solitary point.
Sadly for Benevento – and then-head coach Roberto De Zerbi – Brignoli’s heroics would fail to bring about a sea-change. The club would win just six more matches that season before their inevitable relegation.
Benevento were on a 14-match losing streak, the worst-ever top-flight start by a European side
Alberto Brignoli was hero of the hour with a late strike that drew the minnows level with Milan
ANDRES PALOP HERALDS SEVILLA COMEBACK (MARCH 2007)
Prising a UEFA Cup (now Europa League) title away from Sevilla is no mean feat. The Spanish side are the record-holding winners with an emphatic seven victories in the European competition. Teams who have tried to unseat the club in their favourite tournament have found themselves flummoxed by unexpected form – and in the case of Shakhtar Donetsk, on the end of surprise turnarounds.
After ending their first round-of-16 tie with a 2-2 at home, Sevilla were on the backfoot in Ukraine after falling 2-1 behind courtesy of an 83rd-minute goal from Elano. But with the defence of their first-European trophy on the line, Andres Palop doggedly made his way up the pitch in the 94th minute for Dani Alves’ corner. The Spaniard leapt for the inswinger square on Shakhtar’s net and nodded the ball past Bogdan Shust. The comeback was on.
Ernesto Chevanton sent in the winner on the night as the match spilled into extra-time, but Palop’s equaliser ignited the fight in the tournament’s eventual winners. Plus, the unanticipated strike came with an added bonus.
‘He had to give his son a present by reaching the next round as his boy has been ill in hospital for a week,’ Sevilla coach Juande Ramos shared at full-time. ‘And he has done so and even scored a goal.’
YASSINE BOUNOU LEAVES IT LATE (MARCH 2021)
Sevilla have made a bit of a habit of goalkeepers scoring late equalisers, with Yassine Bounou keen to mimic one of his predecessors during a LaLiga match against Real Valladolid in March 2021.
The Morocco international left it late against the White and Violets but his quick-thinking and quicker feet rescued a crucial point in the away fixture.
Up at the goalmouth, chancing his arm, Bonou watched the ball fly over the box before ending at the feet of a waiting team-mate, who cut back to the goalkeeper in prime position.
Bounou was nerveless as he lifted the ball up and past the massed defenders to write his name into the history books for the Spanish club: he became their first keeper to get themselves onto the scoresheet in domestic league action.
The Morocco international scored his first-ever goal against Real Valladolid in LaLiga in 2021
Sevilla goalkeepers are in the habit of performing late on, with Yassine Bounou mimicking his predecessor Andres Palop
PLUS: HANS-JORG BUTT’S JUVENTUS VENDETTA
Whilst Champions League goalscoring keepers might be few and far between, one has the distinction of netting in the competition and eyebrow-raising three times. But Hans-Jorg Butt’s susprising statistic becomes unlikely by the virtue of his goals coming at three different clubs.
The German goalkeeper found the back of the net for Hamburger SV, Bayer Leverkusen, and Bayern Munich during his 15-year career in Europe, but most curiously of all, each goal came against the same team.
Whether Butt had a visceral dislike for Juventus and if the Old Lady were just sincerely unlucky to come up against a goalkeeper who was a known marksman from the spot on three separate occasions during three separate campaigns, it’s unknown. But the keeper’s prehas-jorg buttdilection for scoring penalties saw the Turin side bested in 2000, 2001, and 2009, all by the same left-sided strike.
Butt was such a coolhead taking penalties that he remains the Bundesliga’s highest-scoring keeper, having scored a mammoth 26 out of 31 penalties taken.
